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CX>PYRIGHT DEPOSIT 




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THE 


WORKS 


OF 


ABRAHAM 


LINCOLN 



ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

The True Story of a Great Life 

With Critical Estimates 
Stories and Anecdotes 



Introductions and Special Articles by 
Theodore Roosevelt William H. Taft 

Charles E. Hughes Joseph H. Choate 

Henry Watterson Robert G. Ingersoll 

And Others 

Managing Editors 
JOHN H. CLIFFORD 
MARION M. MILLER 

Volume I 



THE UNIVERSITY SOCIETY INC. 

NEW YORK 



LIBRARY of CONGRESS 
Two Copies Received 
ftb 10 l^U^^ 

Oopyrttfnt entry 

omi (^ m^ No. 



LIncolniana 



Copyright, 1908 
By The University Society Inc. 



2 

^ PREFACE 

In the preparation of this Life of Abraham 
Lincoln the object of the editors has been to 
make as nearly as possible a distinctively personal 
biography. It is not intended to present a his- 
tory of the origin and early development of the 
Republican party, of anti-slavery discussions, or 
of the Civil War. : The main purpose is to make 
intimately known to the reader the man Abra- 
ham Lincoln from his infancy to his death. 

His ancestry, parentage, childhood and youth ; 
his surroundings and occupations, and the society 
in which he lived, in Kentucky, Indiana, and Illi- 
nois ; the laborer, flatboatman, storekeeper, sol- 
dier, legislator, lawyer; the lone student, making 
the most of his scanty opportunities through all 
the vicissitudes of his strange life — such topics 
are familiarly treated, and the pictures of early 
hardship and struggle supply a most impressive 
background for the study of that grancl career 
whose culmination placed him among "the choice 
and master spirits of this age" and of all ages. 

No novel of frontier life could be so captivat- 
ing as the story of the rail-splitter who proved 
himself "a true-born king of men." The editors 
have endeavored to give this great life-story 
largely through the recitals of those who knew 
Lincoln well in all the periods of his growth and 
activity. Incidents, anecdotes, peculiar experi- 
ences, personal intercourse, interspersed with his 



iv PREFACE 

own unique sayings, both serious and humorous 
— these features render this, in the better sense, 
a ''story-Hfe" of Abraham Lincohi, himself the 
most famous story-teller of his time. 

Besides the biography proper, comprised in 
twenty-six short chapters, this volume contains 
a liberal collection of the most treasured sto- 
ries and anecdotes either told by Lincoln or con- 
cerning him. Every effort has been made to 
include only such "Lincoln stories" as have 
well-established authenticity. 

Here also are estimates of Lincoln's character 
and achievements as presented in the eloquent 
tribute of Robert G. Ingersoll and the memo- 
rable eulogy pronounced by Henry Watterson. 

The life of Lincoln cannot be fully understood 
without a study of his letters and speeches, in- 
cluding the great debates with Stephen A. Doug- 
las. As a stump speaker and an orator of sin- 
gular effectiveness Lincoln left the impress o£ 
his genius on the body politic no less plainly 
marked than the influence of his character and 
deeds. 

Owing to the comparative brevity of the pres- 
ent Life, it has been deemed best to give here 
but few quotations from speeches and letters, but 
in the other volumes of this series all the speeches 
are included, together with as many of the letters 
as are considered interesting or important. Read 
in connection with the Life, these will leave little 
wanting that is needful to a full appreciation of 
the personality and public services of the "first 
American." 

For instance, the reader of the chapter entitled 
"Widening Renown" should also read not only 
the speeches delivered by Lincoln in Ohio after 



PREFACE V 

the famous debates, but likewise the Cooper 
Union (Institute) address and letters written 
at the period of its delivery. Those who are 
interested in the chapter that tells of Lincoln's 
love-affairs should read in connection therewith 
his letters to Speed, to Mrs. Browning, and to 
Miss Owens. 

The editors have received from many publish- 
ers kind permission to use material contained in 
more elaborate biographies. Special acknowl- 
edgment is made to the A. C. McClurg Company 
for selections from Arnold's Life of Abraham 
Lincoln; to the N. D. Thompson Company for 
excerpts from The Every-Day Life of Abraham 
Lincoln, by Francis L. Clarke ; to the Baker and 
Taylor Company for passages taken from the 
Life of Lincoln, by Henry C. Whitney ; and to 
others, for similar favors, thanks are likewise 
due. 

Considerable use has been made of interesting 
material found in Lamon's Life of Lincoln, espe- 
cially such as relates to Lincoln's earlier years. 
From the excellent biographies by Herndon and 
Weik, Joseph IL Barrett, and James Morgan — 
each admirable in many respects — important 
facts, observations, incidents, and anecdotes have 
been borrowed. The editors also acknowledge 
their indebtedness to Ida M. Tarbell's Life of 
Lincoln, than which they have found none more 
complete and satisfactory. 

While nearly all the biographies of Lincoln 
heretofore published have been carefully con- 
sulted, and choice extracts taken from many of 
them, it does not appear necessary to mention 
every work thus drawn upon. Particular credit, 
however, must be given to these: Abraham Lin- 



vi PREFACE 

coin: a History, by John G. Nicolay and John 
Hay; Tlie True Abraham Lincoln, by Wilham 
Eleroy Curtis ; Six Months in the White House, 
by F. B. Carpenter ; Lincoln: Master of Men, by 
Alonzo Rothschild; Abraham Lincoln, by Henry 
Ketcham; Recollections of Abraham Lincoln, 
by Joshua R. Speed; Reminiscences of Abraham 
Lincoln, by distinguished men of his time, edited 
by Allen Thorndike Rice ; and Recollections of 
the Civil War, by Charles A. Dana. 

John H. Clifford. 



CONTENTS 



I. Ancestry of Abraham Lincoln 
II. Birth and Early Life 

III. Life in Indiana .... 

IV. Early Life in Illinois: Laborer and 

Storekeeper .... 

V. Soldier, Postmaster, and Surveyor 
VI. Lincoln Enters Politics: State Legisla 
tor ...... 

VII. Lincoln as a Lawyer 
VIII. Life on the Circuit 

IX. In Congress 

X. The Debates with Douglas 
XI. Widening Renown .... 
XII. Love Affairs and Marriage 

XIII. Education and Literary Traits 

XIV. Personal Characteristics: Physical and 

Mental 

XV. Personal Characteristics: Moral and 
Religious ..... 

XVI. Nomination and Election 
XVII. The President Elect 
XVIII. Journey to Washington and Inaugura 
tion ...... 

XIX. The President and His Cabinet . 
XX. Civil War Begins: l-\ill of Fort Sumter 



PAGE 

I 

lO 

19 

40 

57 

70 
84 
98 

105 
III 
123 

151 
160 

168 
177 
190 

T98' 

208 

217 



^'lii 


CONTPMTS 




CHAPTER 




PAGE 


XXI. 


Lincoln and Ilis Generals 


227 


XXII. 


. Lincoln and His Soldiers 


243 


XXIII. 


Defeats and Victories 


253 


XXIV. 


The Emancipator .... 


263 


XXV. 


Reelection : End of the War . 


271 


XXVI. 


Death of Lincoln : the Nation's Sorrow 


281 



Tributes and Stories: 

The Greatness of Abraham Lincoln 
A Man Inspired of God 
Additional Lincoln Stories 



297 
324 



ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

CHAPTER I 
Ancestry of Abraham Lincoln 

Abraham Lincoln, the sixteenth President of 
the United States, was born in a log cabin in 
the backwoods of Kentucky on the 12th day of 
February, 1809. He was born to a very humble 
station in life, and his early surroundings were 
rude and rough, but his ancestors for generations 
had been of that tough fibre, and vigorous physi- 
cal organization and mental energy, so often 
found among the pioneers on the frontier of 
American civilization. 

His forefathers removed from Massachusetts 
to Pennsylvania in the first half of the seven- 
teenth century ; and from Pennsylvania some 
members of the family moved to Virginia, and 
settled in the valley of the Shenandoah, in the 
county of Rockingham, whence his immediate 
ancestors came to Kentucky. For several genera- 
tions they kept on the crest of the wave of 
Western settlement. 

The family were English, and came from 
Norfolk County, England, about the year 1638, 
when they settled in Hingham, Mass. Mordecai 
Lincoln, the English emigrant to Massachusetts, 
removed afterward to Pennsylvania, and was 
the great-great-grandfather of the President. 
His son John, who was the great-grandfather of 
the President, moved to Virginia, and had a son 
Abraham, the grandfather of the President. He 



2 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

and his son Thomas moved, in 1782, from Rock- 
ingham County, Va., to Kentucky. 

These ancestors of the President were rough, 
hardy, fearless men, and famiHar with wood- 
craft ; men who could endure the extremes of 
fatigue and exposure, who knew how to find food 
and shelter in the forest; brave, self-reliant, 
true and faithful to their friends, and dangerous 
to their enemies. 

The grandfather of the President and his son 
Thomas emigrated to Kentucky in 1781 or 1782, 
and settled in Mercer County. This grandfather 
is named in the surveys of Daniel Boone as hav- 
ing purchased of the United States five hundred 
acres of land. A year or two after this settle- 
ment in Kentucky, Abraham Lincoln, having 
erected a log cabin near ''Bear Grass Fort," the 
site of the present city of Louisville, began to 
open up his farm. 

THE DEATH OF LINCOLN'S GRANDFATHER 

*'One morning, in the year 1784," as related by 
Nicolay and Hay, "Lincoln's grandfather Abra- 
ham started with his three sons, Mordecai, 
Josiah, and Thomas, to the edge of the clearing, 
and began the day's work. A shot from the 
brush killed the father ; Mordecai, the eldest son, 
ran instinctively to the house, Josiah to the neigh- 
boring fort for assistance, and Thomas, the 
youngest, a child of six, was left with the corpse 
of his father. Mordecai, reaching the cabin, 
seized the rifle, and saw through the loophole 
an Indian in his war-paint stooping to raise the 
child from the ground. He took deliberate aim 
at a white ornament on the breast of the savage 



ANCESTRY OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN 3 

and brought him down. The Httle boy, thus 
released, ran to the cabin, and Mordecai, from the 
loft, renewed his fire upon the savages, who be- 
gan to show themselves from the thicket, until 
Josiah returned with assistance from the stockade, 
and the assailants fled. This tragedy made an 
indelible impression on the mind of Mordecai. 
Either a spirit of revenge for his murdered 
father, or a sportsmanlike pleasure in his suc- 
cessful shot, made him a determined Indian- 
stalker, and he rarely stopped to inquire whether 
the red man who came within range of his rifle 
was friendly or hostile." 

UNCLE MORDECAI 

Striking characteristics appear to have been 
noted in all the Lincolns of whom we have any 
accounts. Some reminiscences related of Mor- 
decai, after he had reached manhood, give a 
pleasing glimpse of the boy who showed such 
coolness and daring on the occasion that ended 
his father's life. The following is taken from 
F. F. Browne's interesting Every-Day Life of 
Abraham Lincoln. ''He was naturally a man of 
considerable genius," says one who knew him. 
''He was a man of great drollery, and it would 
almost make you laugh to look at him. I never 
saw but one other man whose quiet, droll look 
excited in me the same disposition to laugh, and 
that was Artemus Ward. Mordecai was quite a 
story-teller, and in this Abe resembled his 'Uncle 
Mord' as we called him. He was an honest man, 
as tender-hearted as a woman, and to the last 
degree charitable and benevolent. . . . Abe 
Lincoln had a very high opinion of his uncle, and 



4 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

on one occasion remarked, 'I have often said that 
Uncle Mord had run off with all the talents of 
the family.' " 

THOMAS LINCOLN 

Thomas Lincoln was but six years old when 
he lost his father, and of the early life of the 
boy we have no knowledge but what can be 
learned of the general lot of his class and of the 
habits and modes of living then prevalent among 
the Kentucky pioneers. ''He grew up," says his 
son, the great Abraham Lincoln, "literally with- 
out education." After his father's death, Thomas 
Lincoln was, as WiUiam E. Curtis tells us, 
''turned adrift, without home or care, for at ten 
years of age we find him 'a wandering laboring 
boy' who was left uneducated and supported him- 
self by farm work and other menial employment, 
and learned the trades of carpenter and cabinet- 
maker. But he must have had good stuff in him, 
for when he was twenty-five years old he had 
saved enough from his wages to buy a farm in 
Hardin County. Local tradition, which, however, 
cannot always be trusted, represents him to have 
been 'an easy-going man, and slow to anger, but 
when roused a formidable adversary.' He was 
above the medium height, had a powerful frame, 
and, like his immortal son, had a wide local repu- 
tation as a wrestler." 



MARRIAGE TO NANCY HANKS 

In 1806 Thomas Lincoln, being then twenty- 
eight years of age, was married to Nancy Hanks, 
who was a native of Virginia. The couple 
settled in what was then Hardin County, Ken- 



ANCESTRY OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN 5 

tucky. It does not appear that the parents of 
Miss Hanks ever removed to Kentucky, though 
others of the family did so. Of the history of 
her ancestry we have no definite particulars. 
Her position in life appears to have been not dis- 
similar to that of her husband. She has been 
described as ''a handsome young woman of lowly 
condition but possessing qualities of intellect and 
character above the average." As she died at an 
early age, having passed her days, from the time 
of her marriage, on obscure frontiers, few recol- 
lections of her remain. She was brought up 
from early years by an aunt. 

At the time of her marriage Nancy Hanks 
was in her twenty-third year. William H. 
Herndon tells us that she was above the ordinary 
height in stature, weighed about one hundred and 
thirty pounds, was slenderly built, and had much 
the appearance of one inclined to consumption. 
Her skin was dark ; hair dark brown ; eyes gray 
and small ; forehead prominent ; face sharp and 
angular, with a marked expression of melancholy 
which fixed itself in the memory of every one who 
ever saw or knew her. Though her life was 
seemingly beclouded by a spirit of sadness, she 
was in disposition amiable and generally cheer- 
ful. "Mr. Lincoln himself," says Herndon, ''said 
to me in 1851, on receiving the news of his 
father's death, that whatever might be said of 
his parents, and however unpromising the early 
surroundings of his mother may have been, she 
was highly intellectual by nature, had a strong 
memory, acute judgment, and was cool and 
heroic. From a mental standpoint she no doubt 
rose above her surroundings, and had she lived, 
the stimulus of her nature would have accelerated 



6 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

lier son's success, and she would have been a 
much more ambitious prompter than his father 
ever was." 

In the midst of her household cares she under- 
took to teach her husband to read and write, and 
also gave her children a start in learning. Of 
her the President, nearly half a century after 
her death, is said to have remarked to William 
H. Seward, ''All that I am or hope to be, I owe 
to my angel mother — blessings on her memory." 

ABRAHAM AS AUTOBIOGRAPHER 

Abraham Lincoln himself never manifested 
much interest in his genealogy. At one time he 
did give out a brief statement of matters 
concerning his ancestors because he was led to 
believe that it might be useful for campaign 
purposes in the great struggle that brought to 
him the Presidency. But at another time, when 
questioned on this head, we are told that he 
replied, "It is a great piece of folly to attempt to 
make anything out of me or my early life. It 
can all be condensed into a single sentence, and 
that sentence you will find in Gray's 'Elegy' : 'The 
short and simple annals of the poor.' That's 
my life, and that's all you or any one else can 
make out of it." 

PERSONALITY OF THOMAS LINCOLN 

Thomas Lincoln was not tall and thin, like 
Abraham, but comparatively short and stout, 
standing about five feet ten inches in his shoes. 
His hair was dark and coarse, his complexion 
brown, his face round and full, his eyes gray. 



ANCESTRY OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN 7 

and his nose large and prominent. He weighed, 
at different times, from one hundred and seventy 
to one hundred and ninety-six pounds. He was 
built so *'tight and compact," that Dennis Hanks 
declares he never could find the points of separa- 
tion between his ribs, though he felt for them 
often. He was a little stoop-shouldered, and 
walked with a slow, halting step. But he was 
sinewy and brave, and, his habitually peaceable 
disposition once fairly overborne, was a tremen- 
dous man in a rough-and-tumble fight. He 
thrashed the monstrous bully of Breckinridge 
County in three minutes, and came off without a 
scratch. 

His vagrant career had supplied him with an 
inexhaustible fund of anecdotes, which he told 
cleverly and well. He loved to sit about at 
"stores" or under shade-trees and ''spin yams" — 
a propensity that atoned for many sins and made 
him extremely popular. In politics he was a 
Democrat — a Jackson Democrat. In religion he 
was nothing at times, and a member of various 
denominations by turns — a Freewill Baptist in 
Kentucky, a Presbyterian in Indiana, and a Disci- 
ple — vulgarly called Campbellite — in Illinois. In 
this last communion he appears to have died. 

THE MOTHER OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

Mrs. Lincoln, the mother of the President, is 
said to have been in her youth a woman of beauty. 
She was by nature refined and of far more than 
ordinary intellect. Her friends spoke of her as 
being a person of marked and decided character. 
She was unusually intelligent, reading all the 
books she could obtain, and was a woman of deep 



8 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

religious feeling, of exemplary character, and 
most tenderly devoted to her family. Her home 
indicated a degree of taste and a love of 
beauty exceptional in the wild settlement in which 
she lived, and, judging from her early death, it 
is probable that she was of a physique less hardy 
than that of most of those by whom she was 
surrounded. But in spite of this she had been 
reared where the very means of existence were to 
be obtained but by a constant struggle, and she 
had learned to use the rifle and the tools of the 
backwoods farmer, as well as the distaff, the 
cards, and the spinning wheel. She could not 
only kill the wild game of the woods, but she 
could also dress it, make of the skins clothes for 
her family and prepare the flesh for food. Hers 
was a strong, self-reliant spirit, which com- 
manded the respect as well as the love of the 
rugged people among whom she lived. 

THOMAS LINCOLN AND HIS WIFE 

The following account of this interesting couple 
in the early days of their life together appears in 
the Reminiscences of Lincoln's Cousin and Play- 
mate, Dennis Hanks, as written down by Mrs. 
Eleanor Atkinson, in 1889, and published in the 
American Magazine, February, 1908. 

"Looks didn't count them days, nowhow. It 
was stren'th an' work an' daredevil. A lazy man 
or a coward was jist pizen, an' a spindlin' feller 
had to stay in the settlemints. The clearin's 
hadn't no use fur him. Tom was strong, an' he 
wasn't lazy nor afeerd o' nothin', but he was kind 
o' shif'less — couldn't git nothin' ahead, an' didn't 
keer putickalar. Lots o' them kind o' fellers in 



ANCESTRY OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN 9 

arly days, 'druther hunt an' fish, an' I reckon they 
had their use. They killed off the varmints an' 
made it safe fur other fellers to go into the woods 
with an ax. 

"When Nancy married Tom he was workin' 
in a carpenter shop. It wasn't Tom's fault he 
couldn't make a iivin' by his trade. Thar was 
sca'cely any money in that kentry. Every man 
had to do his own tinkerin', an' keep everlastin'ly 
at work to git enough to eat. So Tom tuk up 
some land. It v/as mighty ornery land, but it 
was the best Tom could git, when he hadn't much 
to trade fur it. 

"Pore? We was all pore, them days, but the 
Lincolns was porer than anybody. Choppin' 
trees an' grubbin' roots an' splittin' rails an' 
huntin' an' trappin' didn't leave Tom no time. 
. . . It was all he could do to git his fambly 
enough to eat and to kiver 'em. Nancy was 
turrible ashamed o' the way they lived, but she 
knowed Tom was doin' his best, an' she wasn't 
the pesterin' kind. She was purty as a pictur an' 
smart as you'd find 'em anywhere. She could 
read an' write. The Hankses was some smarter'n 
the Lincolns. Tom thought a heap o' Nancy, an' 
he was as good to her as he knowed how. He 
didn't drink or swear or play kyards or fight, an' 
them was drinkin', cussin', quarrelsome days. 
Tom was popylar, an' he could lick a bully if he 
had to. He jist couldn't git ahead, somehow." 



CHAPTER II 

Birth and Early Life of Abraham Lincoln 

It has been ascertained that about a year after 
his marriage Thomas Lincohi, actuated by a rov- 
ing disposition, also by his inherited land-hunger, 
removed his family to a little piece of ground on 
which a clearing had been made and a cabin 
built, situated on the south branch of Nolin Creek, 
three miles from Hodgenville, now the county- 
seat of Larue County, Kentucky. According to 
Ward H. Lamon, who recorded so many interest- 
ing reminiscences of the President, it is not known 
what estate Thomas Lincoln had, or attempted to 
get, in this land. It is said that he bought it, 
but was unable to pay for it. It was very poor, 
and the landscape of which it formed a part was 
extremely desolate. It was then nearly destitute 
of timber, though since partially covered in spots 
by a young and stunted growth of post-oak and 
hickory. On every side the eye rested only upon 
weeds and low bushes, and a kind of grass that 
has been described as ''barren grass." It was, 
on the whole, as bad a piece of ground as there 
was in the neighborhood, and would hardly have 
sold for a dollar an acre. The general appear- 
ance of the surrounding country was not much 
better. A few small but pleasant streams — Nolin 
Creek and its tributaries — wandered through the 
valleys. The land was generally what is called 
"'rolling" — dead levels interspersed by little 



BIRTH AND EARLY LIFE OF LINCOLN ii 

hillocks. Nearly all of it was arable ; but, except 
the margins of the watercourses, not much of it 
was sufficiently fertile to repay the labor of 
tillage. It had no grand, unviolated forests to 
allure the hunter, and no great bodies of deep 
and rich soils to tempt the husbandman. Here 
it was only by incessant labor and thrifty habits 
that an ordinary living could be wrung from the 
earth. 

THE CABIN HOME 

The family lived in a miserable cabin. It stood 
on a little knoll in the midst of a barren glade. 
Such was the mean and narrow tenement which 
sheltered the infancy of one of the greatest polit- 
ical chieftains of modern times. Near by, a 
''romantic spring" gushed from beneath a rock, 
and sent forth a slender but silvery stream, 
meandering through those dull and unsightly 
plains. As it furnished almost the only pleasing 
feature in the melancholy desert through which 
it flowed, the place was called after it, ''Rock 
Spring Farm." After a while it occurred to the 
proprietor that a few trees would look well, and 
might even be useful, if planted in the vicinity of 
his bare house-yard. This enterprise he actually 
achieved ; and three decayed pear-trees, situated 
on the "edge" of what was formerly a rye- 
field, remained after him as the only memorials 
of him or his family to be seen about the 
premises. They were his sole permanent im- 
provement. 

In that solitary cabin, on this desolate spot, 
Abraham Lincoln, perhaps the most illustrious 
man of his century, was born, as already said, on 
the twelfth day of February, 1809. 



12 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 



A BETTER DWELLING-PLACE 

The Lincolns remained on Nolin Creek till 
Abraham was four years old. They then re- 
moved to a place much more picturesque, and of 
far greater fertility. It was situated about six 
miles from Hodgenville, on Knob Creek, a clear 
stream falling into the Rolling Fork, a branch of 
the Salt River, a short distance above the pres- 
ent town of New Haven. Their new farm was 
well timbered and more hilly than that on Nolin 
Creek. It contained some rich valleys, which 
promised such excellent yields, that Lincoln be- 
stirred himself most vigorously, and actually got 
into cultivation the whole of six acres, lying ad- 
vantageously up and down the branch. This, 
however, was not all the work he did, for he still 
continued to potter occasionally at his trade ; 
but, no matter what he turned his hand to, his 
gains were always insignificant. He was satisfied 
with indifferent shelter, and a diet of ''corn-bread 
and milk" was all he asked. John Hanks naively 
observes, that ''happiness was the end of life with 
him." The land he now lived upon (two hundred 
and thirty-eight acres) he had pretended to buy 
from a Mr. Slater. The purchase must have 
been a mere speculation, with all the payments 
deferred, for the title remained in Lincoln but 
a single year. The deed was made to him 
September 2, 1813 ; and October 27, 1814, he con- 
veyed two hundred acres to Charles Milton, leav- 
ing thirty-eight acres of the tract unsold. No 
public record discloses what he did with the re- 
mainder. If he retained any interest in it for the 
time, it was probably permitted to be sold for 
taxes. The last of his voluntary transactions, in 



BIRTH AND EARLY LIFE OF LINCOLN 13 

regard to this land, took place two years before 
his removal to Indiana; after which he appears 
to have continued in possession as the tenant of 
Milton. 

LINCOLN AT SCHOOL 

In those days there were no common schools 
in that country. The principal reliance for ac- 
quiring the rudiments of learning was the same 
as that to which the peasant-poet of Ayrshire was 
indebted. Education was by no means disre- 
garded, nor did young Lincoln, poor as were his 
opportunities, grow up an illiterate boy, as some 
have supposed. Competent teachers were ac- 
customed to offer themselves then, as in later 
years, who opened private schools for a neighbor- 
hood, being supported by tuition-fees or subscrip- 
tion. During his boyhood days in Kentucky, 
Abraham Lincoln attended, at different times, at 
least two schools of this description, of which he 
always retained clear and grateful recollections. 
One of these was kept by Zachariah Riney, whose 
influence was never wholly effaced from Lincoln's 
memory. Though this teacher was himself an 
ardent Catholic, he made no proselyting efforts in 
his school, and when any little religious cere- 
monies, or perhaps mere catechizing and the like, 
were to be gone through with, all Protestant 
children, of whom it is needless to say that young 
Abraham was one, were accustomed to retire, by 
permission or command. Riney was a man of 
excellent character, deep piety, and fairly edu- 
cated. The still existing town of Rineyville, in 
Hardin County, is a tribute to his name. 

Another teacher, on whose instructions the boy 
afterward attended while living in Kentucky, was 



14 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

named Caleb Hazel. His was also a neighbor- 
hood school, sustained by private patronage. 

With the aid of these two schools, and with 
such further assistance as he received at home, 
no doubt Abraham Lincoln had become able to 
read well at the age of seven. That he was not 
a dull or inapt scholar, is manifest from his sub- 
sequent attainments. With the allurements of the 
rifle and the wild game that then abounded in the 
country, however, and with the meagre advan- 
tages he had in regard to books, it is certain that 
his perceptive faculties and his muscular powers 
were much more fully developed by exercise than 
his scholastic talents. 

Abraham Lincoln's mother was persistent in 
her determination to educate her children, and 
although the father's enthusiasm was spasmodic 
and unreliable, still he would occasionally glow 
with pride in his educational plans for his bright, 
intelligent boy. At the age of forty-five Lincoln 
told Leonard Swett that the summuni bonum of 
his father's ambition was to give his boy a £rsf- 
rate education, and that his ne plus ultra of such 
an education was to *'larn to cipher clean through 
the 'rithmetic." 

While he lived in Kentucky young Lincoln 
never saw even the exterior of what was properly 
a church edifice. The religious services he at- 
tended were held either at a private dwelling, or 
in some log schoolhouse, or in the open grove. 

nancy's "boy baby" 

Dennis Hanks's account of the birth of his 
cousin Abraham is given in the most character- 
istic manner, as follows, by Eleanor Atkinson. 



BIRTH AND EARLY LIFE OF LINCOLN 15 

''Tom an' Nancy lived on a farm about two 
miles from us when Abe was born. I ricollect 
Tom comin' over to our house one cold mornin' 
in Feb'uary an' sayin' kind o' slow, 'Nancy's got 
a boy baby.' 

"Mother got flustered an' hurried up 'er work 
to go over to look after the little feller, but I 
didn't have nothin' to wait fur, so I cut an' run 
the hull two mile to see my new cousin. 

"You bet I was tickled to death. Babies wasn't 
as common as blackberries in the woods o' Kain- 
tucky. Mother come over and washed him an' 
put a yaller flannen petticoat on him, an' cooked 
some dried berries with wild honey fur Nancy, 
an' slicked things up an' went home. An' that's 
all the nuss'n either of 'em got. . . . 

"I rolled up in a b'ar skin an' slep' by the fire- 
place that night, so's I could see the little feller 
when he cried and Tom had to git up an' tend to 
him. Nancy let me hold him purty soon. Folks 
often ask me if Abe was a good-lookin' baby. 
Well, now, he looked just like any other baby, at 
fust — like red cherry pulp squeezed dry. An' he 
didn't improve none as be growed older. Abe 
never was much fur looks. I ricollect how Tom 
joked about Abe's long legs when he was toddlin' 
round the cabin. He growed out o' his clothes 
faster'n Nancy could make 'em. 

"But he was mighty good comp'ny, solemn as 
a papoose, but mi^rest^^ in everythin'. An' he 
always did have fits o' cuttin' up. I've seen him 
when he was a little feller, settin' on a stool, 
starin' at a visitor. All of a sudden he'd bust out 
laughin' fit to kill. If he told us what he was 
laughin' at, half the time we couldn't see no 
joke. . . . 



l6 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

"Abe never give Nancy no trouble after he 
could walk excep' to keep him in clothes. Most 
o' the time we went bar'foot. Ever wear a wet 
buckskin glove? Them moccasins wasn't no 
putection ag'inst the wet. Birch bark with hick- 
ory bark soles, strapped on over yarn socks, beat 
buckskin all holler, fur snow. Abe 'n' me got 
purty handy contrivin' things that way. An' Abe 
was right out in the woods, about as soon's he 
was weaned, fishin' in the crick, settin' traps fur 
rabbits an' muskrats, goin' on coon-hunts with 
Tom an' me an' the dogs, follerin' up bees to 
find bee trees, an' drappin' corn fur his pappy. 
Mighty interesfm' life fur a boy, but thar was a 
good many chances he wouldn't live to grow up.'* 

LITTLE ABE SAVED FROM DROWNING 

In his Best Lincoln Stories, ]. E. Gallaher pub- 
lishes the following narrative : 

'The only one of young Lincoln's playmates 
now living [1884] is an old man nearly a hun- 
dred years old, named Austin Gollaher, whose 
mind is bright and clear, and who never tires 
telling of the days Lincoln and he were 'little 
tikes' and played together. This old man, who 
yet lives in the log house in which he has always 
lived, a few miles from the old Lincoln place, tells 
entertaining stories about the President's boy- 
hood." 

'T once saved Lincoln's life," relates Mr. Gol- 
laher. ''We had been going to school together 
one year ; but the next year we had no school, be- 
cause there were so few scholars to attend, there 
being only about twenty in the school the year 
before. 



BIRTH AND EARLY LIFE OF LINCOLN 17 

''Consequently Abe and I had not much to do ; 
but as we did not go to school and our mothers 
were strict with us, we did not get to see each 
other very often. One Sunday morning my 
mother waked me up early, saying she was going 
to see Mrs. Lincoln, and that I could go along. 
Glad of the chance, I was soon dressed and ready 
to go. After my mother and I got there, Abe and 
I played all through the day. 

"While we were wandering up and down the 
little stream called Knob Creek, Abe said : 'Right 
up there' — pointing to the east — 'we saw a covey 
of partridges yesterday. Let's go over.' The 
stream was too wide for us to jump across. 
Finally we saw a foot-log, and we concluded to 
try it. It was narrow, but Abe said, 'Let's coon 
it.' 

"I went first and reached the other side all 
right. Abe went about half-way across, when he 
got scared and began trembling. I hollered to 
him, 'Don't look down nor up nor sideways, but 
look right at me and hold on tight !' But he fell 
ofif into the creek, and as the water was about 
seven or eight feet deep (I could not swim, and 
neither could Abe), I knew it would do no good 
for me to go in after him. 

"So I got a stick — a long water-sprout — and 
held it out to him. He came up, grabbing with 
both hands, and I put the stick into his hands. 
He clung to it, and I pulled him out on the bank, 
almost dead. I got him by the arms and 
shook him well, and then I rolled him on the 
ground, when the water poured out of his 
mouth. 

"He was all right very soon. We promised 
each other that we would never tell anybody 



i8 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

about it, and never did for years. I never told 
any one of it until after Lincoln was killed." 

Abraham's first farm work 

The boy Lincoln, as Ida M. Tarbell, in her 
well-known biography, tells us, learned to know 
his father's farm from line to line, and years 
after, when President of the United States, he 
recalled in a conversation at the White House, 
in the presence of Dr. J. J. Wright of Emporia, 
Kan., the arrangement of the fields and an in- 
cident of his own childish experience as a farm- 
er's son. ''Mr. President," one of the visitors had 
asked, *1iow would you like when the war is over 
to visit your old home in Kentucky?" 'T would 
like it very much," Mr. Lincoln replied. "I re- 
member that old home very well. Our farm was 
composed of three fields. It lay in the valley sur- 
rounded by high hills and deep gorges. Some- 
times when there came a big rain in the hills the 
water would come down through the gorges and 
spread all over the farm. The last thing that I 
remember of doing there was one Saturday after- 
noon ; the other boys planted the corn in what we 
called the big field — it contained seven acres — and 
I dropped the pumpkin-seed. I dropped two 
seeds in every other hill and every other row. 
The next Sunday morning there came a big rain 
in the hills ; it did not rain a drop in the valley, 
but the water coming through the gorges washed 
ground, corn, pumpkin-seeds and all clear off the 
field." 



CHAPTER III 

Life in Indiana 

Unsatisfactory results of his years of toil on 
the lands of Nolin Creek, or a restless spirit of 
adventure and fondness for more stirring pioneer 
experiences than this region continued to afiford, 
or, as some say, his inherited land-hunger, led 
Thomas Lincoln, now nearly forty years of age, 
with a son beginning to be an efficient helper in 
the labors of the farm, to seek a new place of 
abode beyond the Ohio River. 

THE WEST IN 1816 

It is scarcely possible to conceive the peculiar 
conditions of what was the far western portion of 
the country when the Lincolns made this removal. 
Enough, however, can be realized to give us some 
understanding of Abraham's continual privations 
and struggles. In the first place, we must re- 
member that he lived in the woods. The West 
of that day was not wild in the sense of being 
wicked, criminal, ruffian. Morally, if not intel- 
lectually, the people of that region would com- 
pare well with the rest of the country, then or 
now. Although there was little schooling and 
no literary training, the woodsman had an edu- 
cation of his own. The region was wild in the 
sense that it was almost uninhabited and untilled. 
The forests, extending from the mountains on the 
east to the prairies in the west, were almost un- 



20 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

broken and were the abode of wild birds and 
beasts. 

One year after Lincoln's birth, the population 
of Kentucky, white and colored, averaged ten per- 
sons to the square mile. When the Lincolns re- 
moved to Indiana, which in the same year became 
a State of the Union, its population averaged less 
than three persons to the square mile. The popu- 
lation of Illinois was still more thinly scattered. 

POOR CONVENIENCES 

In these regions there were few roads of any 
kind, and none that could be called good, for the 
mud of Indiana and Illinois was deep and tena- 
cious. There were good saddle-horses, a suf- 
ficient number of oxen, and rude carts. Loco- 
motives — not to speak of bicycles, automobiles, 
etc. — were still in the future. The first railroad 
in Indiana — a very primitive affair — was con- 
structed in 1847. Carriages perhaps there were, 
but a good carriage would have been a superfluity 
on those primitive roads. 

Young Lincoln's only pen was the goose-quill, 
and his ink was home-made. Paper was scarce, 
expensive, and, while of good material, poorly 
made. Newspapers were unknown in that forest 
land, and books were few and far between. 

The rude farmers had scythes' and sickles, but 
of a grade that would not be salable to-day at 
any price. Those men little dreamed of our won- 
drous agricultural implements and machinery. As 
little could their wives and daughters imagine 
such superseders of their needles as sewing and 
knitting machines. In the woods thorns were 
used for pins. 



LIFE IN INDIANA 21 

Guns were flint-locks. Tinder-boxes were 
used till friction-matches came. Artificial light 
was supplied chiefly from the open fireplace, 
though tallow dips were known and sometimes 
used. Moulded candles, oil, gas, electricity — 
these illuminants followed, one by one, down to 
our own day. 

In that locality there were no mills for weav- 
ing cotton, linen, or woolen fabrics. All weaving 
was done with the hand-loom, and the common 
fabric of the region was linsey-woolsey — made of 
linen and woolen mixed — and usually not dyed. 

Antiseptics were unknown ; a severe surgical 
operation was likely to mean death for the pa- 
tient; and ether, chloroform, and other anaes- 
thetics were yet to be discovered. 

As to food, wild game was abundant, but the 
kitchen-garden was not developed, and there were 
no importations. No oranges, lemons, bananas ; 
no canned goods ! Crusts of rye bread were 
browned, ground, and boiled to make "coffee." 
Herbs of the woods were dried and steeped for 
tea, and the root of the sassafras furnished an- 
other substitute for the fragrant Oriental bever- 
age. Slippery-elm soaked in cold water sufficed 
for lemonade. Milk-houses were built over 
springs when possible, and the milk-vessels were 
carefully covered to keep out snakes and other 
vermin. 

Whiskey was almost universally used. Indeed, 
in spite of the constitutional "sixteen-to-one," it 
was locally used as the standard of value. The 
use of quinine, which came to be general through- 
out that entire region, was of later date. 

The schools, as we have seen, were primitive 
and inadequate. Itinerant preachers went about. 



22 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

holding "revival meetings," but church buildings 
were rare and of the rudest construction. There 
were no regular means of travel, and even the 
carriers of the Post-Office Department were slow 
in reaching those remote communities. 

It is not easy for us, in the midst of the com- 
forts and luxuries of a later civilization, to 
realize the conditions of Western life previous to 
1825. But the situation must be understood if 
one is to know the life of the boy Lincoln. 

THE BACKWOODS GARB 

His cap in winter was of coonskin, with the 
tail of the animal hanging down behind. In sum- 
mer he wore a misshapen straw hat with no band. 
His shirt of linsey-woolsey was of no color what- 
ever, unless it were the ''color of dirt." His 
breeches were of deerskin with the hair outside. 
In dry weather these were well enough, but when 
wet they hugged the wearer with a clammy em- 
brace, and the victim might have sighed in vain 
for sanitary underwear. These breeches were 
held up by one suspender. The hunting-shirt 
was likewise of deerskin. The stockings — he 
had no stockings. His shoes were cowhide, 
though moccasins made by his mother were 
substituted in dry weather. There was usually 
a space of several inches between the breeches 
and the shoes, exposing a tanned and bluish 
skin. For about half the year he went bare- 
foot. 

Such were the surroundings of Lincoln's early 
childhood, and into an environment of the same 
sort he passed when his father left Kentucky, to 
make a new home in the wilds of Indiana. 



LIFE IN INDIANA 23 

WRECKAGE AND SALVAGE 

In his frequent changes of occupation, Thomas 
Lincohi had become somewhat of a waterman. 
As a flatboatman he had made one trip — perhaps 
a second — to New Orleans. It was therefore 
natural that when, in the fall of 18 16, he finally 
determined to emigrate, he should attempt to 
transport his goods by water. He built himself 
a rickety boat, and launched it on the Rolling 
Fork, at the mouth of Knob Creek, half a mile 
from his cabin. Some of his personal property, 
including carpenter's tools, he put on board, and 
the rest he traded for four hundred gallons of 
whiskey. With this crazy craft and its queer 
cargo, he put out into the stream alone, floating 
with the current down the Rolling Fork, then 
down Salt River, and reaching the Ohio without 
mishap. But here his boat capsized and much of 
his liquid cargo was lost, likewise some of his 
other effects. He fished up a few of the tools and 
part of the whiskey, righted the boat, and floated 
down to a landing at Thompson's Ferry, two and 
a half miles west of Troy, in Perry County, In- 
diana. Here he sold his treacherous boat, and, 
leaving his remaining property in the care of a 
settler named Posey, trudged off in search of 
a 'location" in the wilderness. He found a place 
that he thought would suit him, only sixteen 
miles from the river. He then turned about, and 
walked all the way back to Knob Creek, in Ken- 
tucky, where he took a fresh start with his wife 
and children. 

''packing" to tosey's 

This time Thomas Lincoln loaded what little 
he had left upon two horses, and "packed through 



24 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

to Posey's." Besides clothing and bedding, the 
family carried such cooking utensils as would be 
needed by the way, and would be indispensable 
when they reached their destination. The stock 
was not large. It consisted of ''one oven and 
lid, one skillet and lid, and some tinware." They 
camped out nights, and of course cooked their 
own food. Thomas Lincoln's skill as a hunter 
must now have stood him in good stead. 

When they got to Posey's, Lincoln hired a 
wagon, and loading on it the whiskey and other 
things he had stored there, went on toward the 
place which has since become famous as the 
"Lincoln Farm." He was now making his way 
through an almost untrodden wilderness. There 
was no road, and for part of the distance not 
even a foot-trail. He was sHghtly assisted by a 
path of a few miles in length, which had been 
''blazed out" by an earlier settler named Hos- 
kins. But he was obliged to suffer long delays, 
and to cut out a passage for the wagon with his 
ax. At length, after manv detentions and diffi- 
culties, he reached the point where he intended to 
make his future home. It was situated between 
the forks of Big Pigeon and Little Pigeon creeks, 
a mile and a half east of Gentryville, now in 
Spencer County, a village which grew up after- 
ward, and now numbers several hundred inhabi- 
tants. The whole country was covered with a 
dense forest of oaks, beeches, walnuts, sugar- 
maples, and nearly all other varieties of trees that 
flourish in North America. The woods were 
usually open and devoid of underbrush; the 
trees were of the largest growth, and beneath 
their deep shade was spread out a rich green- 
sward. The natural grazing was very good, and 



LIFE IN INDIANA 25 

hogs found sustenance in the prodigious quantity 
of mast. There was occasionally a little glade or 
prairie set down in the midst of this vast ex- 
panse of forest. One of these, not far from the 
Lincoln place, was a famous resort for deer, and 
the hunters knew it well for its numerous licks. 
Upon this prairie the militia musters were had at 
a later day, and from it the south fork of the 
Pigeon came finally to be known as the "Prairie 
Fork." 

THE INDIANA HOME 

Thomas Lincoln located his dwelling on a 
gentle hillock having a slope on every side. The 
spot was very beautiful and the soil was excellent. 
The selection was wise in every respect but one. 
There was no water near except what was col- 
lected in holes in the ground after a rain, and 
that was very foul, and had to be strained before 
using. At a later period we find Abraham and 
his sister carrying water from a spring situated a 
mile away. Dennis Hanks asserts that Tom Lin- 
coln ''riddled his land like a honeycomb," in 
search of good water, and was at last sorely 
tempted to employ a Yankee who came around 
with a divining-rod, and declared that for the 
small consideration of five dollars in cash, he 
would make his rod point to a cool, flowing 
spring beneath the surface. 

Here Thomas Lincoln built "a half-faced 
camp" — a cabin enclosed on three sides and open 
on the fourth. It was built, not of logs, but of 
poles, and was therefore denominated a ''camp" 
to distinguish it from a "cabin." It was about 
fourteen feet square and had no floor. 

In 18 1 7 Thomas Lincoln provided a better shel- 



26 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

ter for his family by building a log cabin. This 
second dwelling was a rough log house ; the tim- 
bers were not hewed ; and until after the arrival 
of Sally Bush, in 1819, it had neither floor, door, 
nor window. It stood about forty yards from 
what Dennis Hanks calls that "darned little half- 
faced camp." It was ''right in the bush" — in the 
heart of a virgin wilderness. There were only 
seven or eight older settlers in the neighborhood 
of the two Pigeon creeks. Lincoln had had 
some previous acquaintance with one of them, 
a Mr. Thomas Carter; and it is highly probable 
that nothing but this trivial circumstance induced 
him to settle here. 

In the fall of 181 7 Thomas and Betsy Spar- 
row came out from Kentucky, and took up their 
abode in the old camp which the Lincolns had 
just deserted for the cabin. Betsy was the aunt 
who had raised Nancy Hanks. She had done the 
same in part for our friend Dennis Hanks, who 
was the offspring of another sister, and she now 
brought him with her. Dennis thus became the 
constant companion of young Abraham ; and after 
all the other members of that family, as originally 
settled in Indiana, were dead, Dennis became a 
most important witness as to this period of Abra- 
ham Lincoln's life. 



SCHOOL AND READING 

For some time after the settlement in In- 
diana, there was no school in that primitive, 
sparsely settled neighborhood, but when Abra- 
ham was eleven years of age there was a school 
opened in a log shanty about one and a half miles 
distant from his home, by one Hazel Dorsey — the 



LIFE IN INDIANA 27 

term "Hazel," which formed a component part 
of the teacher's name, being supposed to refer ro 
a species of twig whose use in the rude school- 
room was auxiliary to good scholarship. Andrew 
Crawford was Abraham's next teacher, his minis- 
trations occurring in the winter of 1822-23, as 
nearly as can be defined. Finally one Swaney 
opened a school, pronounced by him sk^ile, about 
five miles from the Lincoln home in 1826, which 
Lincoln attended for a very short time, and these 
three schools in Indiana and the two in Kentucky 
comprise all that he ever attended ; the total time 
consumed (as Lincoln told Swett) being about 
four months in all. And such schools ! 

In those days books were rare and his library 
was small but select. It consisted at first of three 
volumes, the Bible, ^sop's Fables, and Pilgrim's 
Progress. He read and digested them until they 
were his own. Better books he could not have 
found in all the universities of Europe, and we 
begin to understand where he got his moral vi- 
sion, his precision of English style, and his 
shrewd humor. 

Later he borrowed from a neighbor, Josiah 
Crawford, a copy of Weems's Life of Washing- 
ton. In lieu of a bookcase he tucked this, one 
night, into the chinking of the cabin. A rain- 
storm ruined it, and Lincoln having no money 
wherewith to repay Crawford for the loss, it was 
agreed that Abraham should recompense him 
by pulling fodder for three days. 

Still later Abraham had a life of Henry Clay, 
whom he almost idolized. His one poet was 
Burns, whom he learned by heart, and ever after 
ranked next to Shakspeare. 

Having no slate, he did his "sums" in the sand 



28 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

on the ground, or on a wooden shovel, which, 
after it was covered on both sides, he scraped 
down so as to erase the work. A note-book is 
preserved, containing, along with examples in 
arithmetic, this boyish doggerel : 

Abraham Lincoln 
his hand and pen. 
he will be good, but 
god knows When. 

The penmanship bears a striking resemblance 
to that in later life. 

THE mother's death 

In 1818 the milk-sickness wrought fatalities in 
that region. Mr. and Mrs. Sparrow were at- 
tacked by it and were removed, for better care, to 
the home of the Lincolns, where they soon died. 
Mrs. Lincoln was smitten by the same scourge. 
There was no doctor to be had, the nearest one 
being thirty-five miles away, and the mother of 
the future President did not long survive. 

The widowed husband was undertaker. With 
his own hands he rived the planks, made the cof- 
fin, and buried Nancy Hanks, that remarkable 
woman. There was no pastor, no funeral service. 
It is said that several months later Abraham "in- 
duced a traveling preacher to accompany him to 
the grave and there" give to the dead mother 
more solemn rites. 

Nancy Hanks Lincoln did her duty lovingly. 
In later years the nation joined with her son in 
paying honor to her memory. 

the desolated home 
The loss of his mother was the first great grief 
of young Abraham, then not quite ten years old. 



LIFE IN INDIANA 29 

The love of reading acquired through her in- 
spiration and help was of itself enough, in his 
condition, to justify his saying: 

"All that I am or hope to be, I owe to my angel 
mother." 

His recollection of her seemed always to be 
quite clear and vivid, and he ever spoke of her 
with tenderness and reverence. 

What could be done as housekeeper by a girl 
of twelve, Sarah, Abraham's sister, did for more 
than a year; but a matron's care was too visibly 
lacking, and the father decided to ask the help 
and hand of one he had early known as Sally 
Bush, then living in widowhood at Elizabethtown, 
Ky. vShe had married Daniel Johnston, the jailer, 
who died leaving three children' and a little 
property. 

His widow continued to live at Elizabethtown 
till December 2, 1819. Thomas Lincoln re- 
turned to this place on the first day of December, 
and inquired for the residence of Widow John- 
ston. He was not slow to present himself be- 
fore her, then occurred the following courtship, 
as related by Samuel Haycraf t, clerk of the Court 
of Hardin County : 

''He said to her : T am a lone man, and you 
are a lone woman. I have knowed you from a 
girl, and you have knowed me from a boy ; and 
I have come all the way from Indiana to ask if 
you'll marry me right off, as I've no time to lose.* 

*'To which she replied : 'Tommy Lincoln, I 
have no objection to marrying you, but I cannot 
do it right off, for I owe several little debts 
which must first be paid/ 

"The gallant man promptly said : 'Give me a 
list of vour debts.' 



30 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

"The list was furnished, and the debts were paid 
the same evening. The next morning, December 2, 
1819, I issued the Hcense, and the same day they 
were married, bundled up, and started for home." 

THE NEW MOTHER 

Mrs. Johnston has been called a ''poor widow," 
but she possessed goods which, in the eyes of 
Tom Lincoln, were almost of unparalleled mag- 
nificence. Among other things, she had a bureau 
that cost forty dollars ; and he informed her, on 
their arrival in Indiana, that, in his deliberate 
opinion, it was little less than sinful to be the 
owner of such a thing. He demanded that she 
should turn it into cash, which she positively 
refused to do. She had quite a lot of other 
articles, however, which he thought well enough 
in their way, and some of which were sadly 
needed in his miserable cabin in the wilds of 
Indiana. Dennis Hanks speaks with great 
rapture of the "large supply of household goods" 
which she brought out with her. There was "one 
fine bureau, one table, one set of chairs, one large 
clothes-chest, cooking utensils, knives, forks, 
bedding, and other articles." It was a glorious 
day for little Abe and Sarah and Dennis when 
this wondrous collection of rich furniture arrived 
in the Pigeon Creek settlement. But all this 
wealth required extraordinary means of trans- 
portation ; and Lincoln had recourse to his 
brother-in-law, Ralph Krume, who lived just 
over the line, in Breckinridge County. Krume 
came with a four-horse team, and moved Mrs. 
Johnston, now Mrs. Lincoln, with her family 
and effects, to the home of her new husband in 
Indiana. Mrs. Lincoln's own goods furnished 



LIFE IN INDIANA 31 

the cabin with tolerable decency. She made 
Lincoln put down a floor, and hang windows and 
doors. It was in the depth of winter; and the 
children, as they nestled in the warm beds she 
provided them, enjoying the strange luxury of 
security from the cold winds of December, must 
have thanked her from the bottoms of their 
newly comforted hearts. She had brought a son 
and two daughters of her own — John, Sarah, and 
Matilda ; but little Abe and his sister, the ragged 
and hapless little strangers to her brood, were 
given an equal place in her affections. They 
were half naked, and she clad them from the 
stores of clothing she had laid up for her own. 
They were dirty, and she washed them ; they had 
been ill-used, and she treated them with motherly 
tenderness. In her own modest language, she 
"made them look a little more human." "In 
fact," says Dennis Hanks, "in a few weeks all 
had changed ; and where everything was want- 
ing, now all was snug and comfortable. She 
was a woman of great energy, of remarkable 
good sense, very industrious and saving, and also 
very neat and tidy in her person and manners, 
and knew exactly how to manage children. She 
took an especial liking to young Abe. Her love 
for him was warmly returned, and continued to 
the day of his death. But few children love their 
parents as he loved his stepmother. She soon 
dressed him up in entire new clothes, and from 
that time on he appeared to lead a new life. He 
was encouraged by her to study, and any wish 
on his part was gratified when it could be done. 
The two sets of children got along finely together, 
as if they had all been the children of the same 
parents." 



32 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

Says a biographer of Lincoln : "The influence 

upon the growing lad of two such women as 

Nancy Hanks and Sally Bush was worth more 

than that of the best-appointed college in all the 

land." 

GROWTH IN STATURE AND MIND 

The boy grew into youth, and he grew very 
fast. While still in his teens he reached the full 
stature of his manhood, six feet and four inches. 
His strength was astonishing, and many stories 
were told of this and subsequent periods to illus- 
trate his physical prowess. Like his father, it is 
said, he was usually victorious in muscular con- 
tests. 

During the period of his growth into youth he 
spent much of his time in reading, talking, and, 
after a fashion, making speeches. He also did 
some writing, and his political writings won 
great admiration from his neighbors. He occa- 
sionally wrote satires which, while not refined, 
were very stinging. This would not be worth 
mentioning were it not for the fact that it shows 
that from boyhood he knew the force of this 
formidable weapon which later he used with so 
much skill. The country store furnished the 
frontier substitute for the club, and there the men 
were wont to congregate. Young Lincoln was 
the life of the gatherings, being an expert story- 
teller and having a plentiful supply of humorous 
anecdotes. His speech-making proved so attract- 
ive that his father was forced to forbid him to 
practice it during working hours because the men 
would always leave their work to listen to him. 

During these years he had no regular employ- 



LIFE IN INDIANA 33 

ment, but did odd jobs wherever he got a chance. 
At one time he worked on a ferryboat for 37J 
cents a day. 

STIRRED BY AN ORATOR 

When sixteen years old, Lincoln had his 
first lesson in oratory. He attended court at 
Boonville, county-seat of Warrick County, and 
heard a case in which one of the aristocratic 
Breckinridges of Kentucky was attorney for the 
defence. The power of his oratory was a revela- 
tion to the lad. At its conclusion the awkward, 
ill-dressed, bashful, but enthusiastic young Lin- 
coln pressed forward to offer his congratulations 
and thanks to the eloquent lawyer, who haughtily 
brushed by him without accepting the profTered 
hand. In later years the men met again, this 
time in the White House. The President re- 
minded Breckinridge of the incident, which the 
latter had no desire to recall. 



FLATBOATMAN 

When about nineteen years old, Lincoln made 
his first voyage down the Ohio and Mississippi 
rivers. Two incidents are worth recording of 
this trip. The purpose was to find, in New 
Orleans, a market for produce, which w^s simply 
floated down stream on a flatboat. The crew 
consisted of himself and young Gentry, son of 
James Gentry, Lincoln's employer for this under- 
taking. 

Near Baton Rouge they had tied up for the 
night in accordance with the custom of flatboat 
navigation. It is said that in the night they were 



34 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

awakened by a gang of seven ruffian negroes who 
had come aboard to loot the stuff. Lincoln 
shouted, "Who's there?" Receiving no reply, he 
seized a handspike and beat off the intruders ; 
then the boatmen loosed their craft and floated 
safely to their destination. 

The goods were sold profitably at New Orleans, 
and the return trip was made by steamboat. The 
steamboats then used on the Ohio and Mississippi 
rivers were primitive affairs, awkward and slow, 
and subject to frequent boiler-explosions. With- 
out further mishap, however, Lincoln and Gentry 
duly reached home after their successful expedi- 
tion. 

THE stepmother's TRIBUTE 

As Lincoln was now nearing his majority, this 
is a fitting place to present the testimony of Sally 
Bush, his stepmother, concerning him. "Abe," 
she tells us, "was a good boy, and I can say what 
scarcely one woman — a mother — can say in a 
thousand : Abe never gave me a cross word or 
look, and never refused, in fact or appearance, 
to do anything I requested him. I never gave 
him a cross word in all my life. . . . He was 
a dutiful son to me always. I think he loved me 
truly. I had a son John, who was raised with 
Abe^ Both were good boys ; but I must say, both 
being now dead, that Abe was the best boy I ever 
saw, or expect to see." 

THE BOY WAS FATHER OF THE MAN 

Lincoln came into the estate of manhood mor- 
ally clean. He had formed no habits that would 
cause years of struggle to overcome, he had com- 



LIFE IN INDIANA 35 

mitted no deed that would bring the blush of 
shame to his cheek, he was as free from vice 
as from crime. He was not profane, was no 
brawler, never gambled, and he was honest and 
truthful. He had a genius for making friends, 
and was the centre of his social circle. With- 
out a thought of the great responsibilities await- 
ing him, he had thus far fitted himself well for 
the future by his faithfulness in such duties as 
fell to him. 

HOME-MADE WRITING MATERIALS ; WEBSTER'S 
"speller" ; '^ARABIAN NIGHTS" 

As to the material with which Lincoln learned 
to write, ''Uncle" Dennis says: ''Sometimes he 
would write with a piece of charcoal, or the p'int 
of a burnt stick, on the fence or floor. We got a 
little paper at the country town, and I made ink 
out of blackberry brier-root and a little copperas 
in it. It was black, but the copperas would eat 
the paper after a while. I made his first pen out 
of a turkey-buzzard feather. We had no geese 
them days. After he learned to write he was 
scratchin' his name everywhere ; sometimes he 
would write it on the white sand down by the 
crick bank, and leave it till the waves would blot 
it out. 

"His first reading-book was Webster's 'Speller.' 
Then he got hold of a book — I can't ricollect the 
name. It told a yarn about a feller, a nigger or 
suthin', that sailed a flatboat up to a rock, and 
the rock was magnetized and drawed the nails 
out of his boat, an' he got a duckin', or drownded, 
or suthin', I forget now. | It was the Arabian 
Nights.] Abe would lay on the floor with a 



36 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

chair under his head, and laugh over them stories 
by the hour. I told him they was likely lies from 
end to end ; but he learned to read right well in 
them." 

A SCHOOL OF MANNERS 

One of Lincoln's teachers, Andrew Crawford, 
taught "manners" in his school — a new feature 
of backwoods education. According to Lamon, 
one of the scholars was required to retire, and re- 
enter as a polite gentleman is supposed to enter 
a drawing-room. He was received at the door 
by another scholar, and conducted from bench to 
bench, till he had been introduced to all the 
''young ladies and gentlemen" in the room. Abe 
went through the ordeal many times. If he took a 
serious view of the business, it must have put him 
to exquisite torture ; for he was conscious that 
he was not a perfect type of manly beauty, with 
his long legs and blue shins, his small head, his 
great ears, and shriveled skin. If, however, it 
struck him as at all funny, it must have filled 
him with unspeakable mirth, and given rise to 
many antics, tricks, and sly jokes, as he was 
gravely led about, shamefaced and gawky, under 
the very eye of the precise Crawford, to be intro- 
duced to the boys and girls of his most ancient 
acquaintance. 

But, though Crawford inculcated manners, he 
by no means neglected spelling. Abe was a good 
speller, and liked to use his knowledge, not 
only to secure honors for himself, but to help 
his less fortunate schoolmates out of their troub- 
les, and he was exceedingly ingenious in the 
selection of expedients for conveying prohibited 
hints. One day Crawford gave out the difficult 



LIFE IN INDIANA 37 

word defied, A large class was on the floor, but 
they all provokingly failed to spell it. D-e-f-i-d-e, 
said one ; d-e-f-y-d-e, said another ; d-e-f-y-d, 
d-e-f-y-e-d, cried another and another. But it 
was all wrong ; it was shameful, that, among all 
these big boys and girls, nobody could spell 
''defied" ; and Crawford's wrath gathered in 
clouds over his terrible brow. He made the help- 
less culprits shake with fear. He declared he 
would keep the whole class in all day and all 
night if 'defied" was not spelled. There was 
among them a Miss Roby, a girl fifteen years of 
age, whom we must suppose to have been pretty, 
for Abe was evidently half in love with her. "I 
saw Lincoln at the window," says she. "He had 
his finger in his eye, and a smile on his face ; I 
instantly took the hint, that I must change the 
letter y into an i. Hence I spelled the word — the 
class let out. I felt grateful to Lincoln for this 
simple thing." 

LINCOLN AS A STRONG MAN 

"Abe," we are told, "had now become not only 
the longest, but also the strongest, man in the 
settlement." Some of his reported feats almost 
surpass belief, and those who beheld them with 
their own eyes stood amazed. Richardson, a 
neighbor, declares that he could carry a load to 
which the strength of "three ordinary men" 
would scarcely be equal. He saw him quietly 
pick up and walk away with "a chicken-house, 
made up of poles pinned together, and covered, 
that weighed at least six hundred, if not much 
more." At another time the Richardsons were 
building a corn-crib ; Abe was there, and, seeing 



38 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

three or four men preparing "sticks" upon which 
to carry some huge posts, he reHeved them of 
all further trouble by shouldering the posts, 
single-handed, and walking away with them to 
the place where they were wanted. ''He could 
strike with a maul," says old Mr. Wood, *'a 
heavier blow than any man. He could sink an 
ax deeper into wood than any man I ever saw." 

MAN-OF-ALL-WORK 

In 1825 Abraham was employed by James 
Taylor, who lived at the mouth of Anderson's 
Creek. He was paid six dollars a month, and 
remained for nine months. His principal busi- 
ness was the management of a ferry-boat which 
Mr. Taylor had plying across the Ohio, as well 
as Anderson's Creek. But, in addition to this, 
he was required to do all sorts of farm work, 
and even to perform some menial services about 
the house. He was hostler, ploughman and 
ferryman, and man-of-all-work. He ground corn 
with a hand-mill, or "grated" it when too young 
to be ground ; rose early, built fires, put on the 
water in the kitchen, "fixed around generally," 
and had things prepared for cooking before the 
mistress of the house was stirring. He slept 
up-stairs with young Green Taylor, who says that 
he usually read "till near midnight," notwith- 
standing the necessity for being out of his bed 
before day. Green was somewhat disposed to ill- 
use the poor hired boy, and once struck him with 
an ear of hard corn, and cut a deep gash over 
his eye. He makes no comment upon this un- 
generous act, except that "Abe got mad," but did 
not thrash him. 



LIFE IN INDIANA 39 

ABE OPPOSES CRUELTY TO ANIMALS 

While in Crawford's school, the lad made his 
first essay in writing compositions. The exer- 
cise was not required by the teacher, but ''he took 
it up on his own account." He first wrote short 
sentences against "cruelty to animals," and at 
last came forward with a regular composition on 
the subject. He was very much annoyed and 
pained by the conduct of the boys, who were in 
the habit of catching terrapins and putting coals 
of fire on their backs. "He would chide us," 
says Nat Grigsby, "tell us it was wrong, and 
would write against it." 

One day his stepbrother, John D. Johnston, 
''caught a terrapin, and brought it to the place 
where Abe was 'preaching,' threw it against the 
tree, and crushed the shell. It suffered much, 
quivered all over. Abe then preached against 
cruelty to animals, contending that an ant's life 
was as sweet to it as ours to us." 

DEATH OF Lincoln's sister 
Abraham's sister Sarah was warmly attached 
to her brother. "It is said that her face some- 
w^hat resembled his. In repose it had the gravity 
which they both, perhaps, inherited from their 
mother, but it was capable of being lighted al- 
most into beauty by one of -Abe's ridiculous 
stories or rapturous sallies of humor. She was 
a modest, plain, industrious girl, and is kindly 
remembered by all who knew her. She was 
married to Aaron Grigsby at eighteen, and died 
a year after. Like Abe, she occasionally worked 
out at the houses of the neighbors. She lies 
buried, not with her mother, but in the yard of 
the old Pigeon Creek meeting-house." 



CHAPTER IV 
Early Life in Illinois : Laborer and Storekeeper 

The continued prevalence of the milk-sickness, 
with which Nancy Hanks, the Sparrows, and 
others had died, was more than a sufficient reason 
for a new removal, now in contemplation by 
Thomas Lincoln. From the first settlement in 
Indiana, every member of his family, except per- 
haps Abe and himself, had suffered with it. The 
cattle, which, it is true, were of little pecuniary 
value, and raised with great ease and little cost, 
were swept away by it in great numbers through- 
out the whole neighborhood. It was an awful 
scourge, and common prudence suggested flight. 
It is wonderful that it took a constitutional mover 
thirteen years to make up his mind to escape from 
it. 

Dennis Hanks explained the removal as 
follows : 

''What made Thomas Lincoln leave? The 
reason is this : We were perplexed by a disease 
called milk-sick. I myself being the oldest, I 
was determined to leave, and hunt a country 
where the milk-sick was not. I married his eldest 
daughter. I sold out, and they concluded to go 
with me. I was tolerably popular at that time, 
for I had some money. My wife's mother could 
not think of parting with her, and we ripped 
up stakes, and started to Illinois, and landed at 
Decatur. This is the reason for leaving Indiana. 
I am to blame for it, if any. As for getting more 



EARLY LIFE IN ILLINOIS 41 

land, this was not the case, for we could have 
entered ten thousand acres of the best. land. 
When we left, it was on account of the milk. I 
had four good milch cows, too, with it in one 
week, and eleven young calves. This was enough 
to run me. Besides, liked to have lossed my own 
life with it. This reason was enough (ain't it?) 
for leaving." 

THE ILLINOIS HOME 

In the spring of 1830, before the winter had 
fairly broken up, Thomas Lincoln and Abe, Dennis 
Hanks, and Levi Hall, like Dennis, second cousin 
to Abe, with their respective families — thirteen 
persons in all — took the road for Illinois. Dennis 
and Levi were married to the daughters of Mrs. 
Lincoln. Hall had one son, and Dennis a con- 
siderable family of sons and daughters. 

Nancy Lincoln's cousin John Hanks had gone 
to the new country in the fall of 1828, and settled 
near Decatur, whence he wrote Thomas Lincoln 
all about it, and advised him to come there. 
Dennis, whether because of the persuasions of 
John, or some observations made in a flying trip 
on his own account, was very full of the move, 
and would hear of no delay. Lincoln sold his 
farm to Gentry, senior, if, indeed, he had not 
done so before, and his corn and hogs to Dave 
Turnham. The corn brought only ten cents a 
bushel, and, according to the price-list furnished 
by Dennis Hanks, the stock must have gone at 
figures equally mean. 

Lincoln took with him to Illinois ''some stock- 
cattle, one horse, one bureau, one table, one 
clothes-chest, one set of chairs, cooking utensils. 



42 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

clothing," etc. The goods of the three famiUes — 
Hanks, Hall, and Lincoln — were loaded on a 
wagon belonging to Lincoln. This wagon was 
"ironed," a noticeable fact in those primitive days, 
and "was positively the first one that he ever 
owned." It was drawn by four yoke of oxen — 
two of them Lincoln's and two of them Hanks's. 
We have no particulars of the journey, except 
that Abe held the "gad" and drove the team ; 
that the mud was very deep, that the spring 
freshets were abroad, and that in crossing the 
swollen and tumultuous Kaskaskia, the wagon 
and oxen were nearly swept away. On the first 
day of March, 1830, after fifteen days' tedious 
and heavy travel, they arrived at John Hanks's 
house, four miles northwest of Decatur. Lincoln 
settled (if anything he did may be called settling) 
at a point ten miles west of Decatur. Here John 
Hanks had cut some logs in 1829, which he now 
gave to Lincoln to build a house with. With the 
aid of John, Dennis, Abe, and Hall, a house was 
erected on a small blufif, on the north bank of 
the north fork of the Sangamon. Abe and John 
took the four yoke of oxen and ''broke up" fifteen 
acres of land, and then split rails enough to fence 
it in. 

LEAVING FATHER AND MOTHER 

Abe was now over twenty-one. He had done 
something more than his duty by his father ; and 
as that worthy was now again placed in a situa- 
tion where he might do well if he chose, Abe came 
to the conclusion that it was time for him to be- 
gin life on his own account. It must have cost 
him some pain to leave his good stepmother ; but 
beyond that, all the old ties were probably broken 



EARLY LIFE IN ILLINOIS 43 

without a single regret. From the moment he was 
a free man, foot-loose, able to go where, and to 
do what, he pleased, his success in those things 
which lay nearest his heart — public and social 
preferment — was astonishing to himself as well 
as to others. 

Abe left the Lincoln family late in March, or 
early in April, 1830. He did not go far away, but 
took jobs wherever he could get them, showing 
that he had separated himself from the family, 
not merely to rove, but to labor, and be an inde- 
pendent man. He made no engagement of a 
permanent character during this summer : his 
work was all done ''by the job." All this while 
he clung close to John Hanks, and either worked 
where he did, or not far away. In the winter 
following, he was employed by a Major Warrick 
to make rails, and walked daily three miles to his 
work, and three miles back again. 

DEATH OF THOMAS LINCOLN 

Thomas Lincoln, after Abraham left him, 
moved at least three times in search of a 
''healthy" location, and finally got himself fixed 
near Goose Nest Prairie, in Coles County, where 
he died of a disease of the kidneys, in 185 1, at 
the age of seventy-three. The little farm (forty 
acres) upon which his days were ended, he had, 
with his usual improvidence, mortgaged to the 
School Commissioners for two hundred dollars — 
its full value. Induced by love for his step- 
mother, Abraham had paid the debt and taken a 
deed for the land, "with a reservation of a life- 
estate therein, to them, or the survivor of them." 
At the same time (1841), he gave a helping hand 



44 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

to John D. Johnston. This he did by binding 
himself to convey the land to him, or his heirs, 
after the death of "Thomas Lincoln and his wife," 
upon payment of the two hundred dollars, which 
was really advanced to save John's mother from 
utter penury. No matter how much the land 
might appreciate in value, John was to have it 
upon these terms, and no interest was to be paid 
by him, ''except after the death of the survivor, 
as aforesaid." This, to be sure, was a great 
bargain for John, but he made haste to assign 
his bond to another person for ''fifty dollars paid 
in hand." 

As soon as Abraham got a little up in the world, 
he began to send his stepmother money, and he 
continued to do so till his own death ; but it is 
said to have "done her no good," for it only 
served to tempt certain persons about her, and 
with whom she shared it, to continue in a life of 
idleness. At the close of the Black Hawk War, 
Lincoln went to see them for a few days, and 
afterward, when a young lawyer, making the 
circuits with the courts, he visited them when- 
ever the necessities of his practice brought him 
to their neighborhood. He did his best to serve 
Mrs. Lincoln and her son John, but took little 
notice of his father, although he wrote him an 
exhortation to believe in God when he thought he 
was on his death-bed. 



AGAIN TO NEW ORLEANS 

In February, 1831, one Denton Offutt wanted 
to engage John Hanks to take a flatboat to New 
Orleans. John was not well disposed to the busi- 
ness; but Offutt came to the house, and would 



EARLY LIFE IN ILLINOIS 45 

take no denial ; made much of John's fame as a 
river-man, and at length persuaded him to pre- 
sent the matter to Abe and John D. Johnston. 
He did so. The three friends discussed the ques- 
tion with great earnestness : it was no slight affair 
to them, for they were all young and poor. At 
length they agreed to Offutt's proposition, and 
that agreement was the turning-point in Abe's 
career. They were each to receive fifty cents a 
day, and the round sum of sixty dollars divided 
among them for making the trip. These were 
wages such as Abe had never received before, 
and might have tempted him to a much more 
difficult enterprise. When he went with Gentry 
his pay was much smaller, and he had no such 
company and assistance as he was to have now. 
But Offutt, who is described as "a bibulous, devil- 
may-care sort of person," was lavish with his 
money, and generous bargains like this ruined him 
a little while after. 

In March, Hanks, Johnston, and Lincoln went 
down the Sangamon in a canoe to Jamestown 
(then Judy's Ferry), five miles east of Spring- 
field. Thence they walked to Springfield, and 
found Mr. Offutt comforting himself at "Elliott's 
tavern in Old Town." He had contracted to have 
a boat ready at the mouth of Spring Creek, but, 
not looking after it himself, was, of course, ''disap- 
pointed." There was only one way out of the 
trouble : the three hands must build a boat. They 
went to the mouth of Spring Creek, five miles 
north of Springfield, and there consumed two 
weeks cutting the timber from ''Congress land." 
In the mean time, Abe walked back to Judy's 
Ferry, by way of Springfield, and brought down 
the canoe which they had left at the former place. 



46 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

The timber was hewed and scored, and then 
"rafted down to Sangamontown." At the mouth 
of Spring Creek they had been compelled to walk 
a full mile for their meals ; but at Sangamontown 
they built a shanty and boarded themselves. 
"Abe was elected cook," and performed the duties 
of the office much to the satisfaction of the party. 
The lumber was sawed at Kirkpatrick's mill, a 
mile and a half from the shanty. Laboring under 
many disadvantages like this, they managed to 
complete and launch the boat in about four weeks 
from the time of beginning. 

Offutt was with the party at this point. He 
was a Whig, and so was Abe ; but Abe could not 
hear Jackson wrongfully abused, especially where 
a He and malice did the abuse. Out of this 
difference arose some disputes, which served to 
enliven the camp, as well as to arouse Abe's 
ire, and keep him in practice in the way of 
debate. 

In those days Abe, as usual, is described as be- 
ing ''funny, jokey, full of yarns, stories, and rigs" ; 
as being ''long, tall, and green," "frequently quot- 
ing poetry," and "reciting proselike orations." 
They had their own amusements. 

Loaded with barrel-pork, hogs, and corn, the 
boat set out from Sangamontown as soon as 
finished. Offutt was on board to act as his own 
merchant, intending to pick up additions to his 
cargo along the banks of the two Illinois rivers 
down which he was about to pass. On April 19 
they arrived at New Salem, a little village 
destined to be the scene of six eventful years of 
Lincoln's life, which immediately followed the 
conclusion of the present trip. Here the boat 
stuck on the mill-dam that crossed the Sangamon. 



EARLY LIFE IN ILLINOIS 47 

Off utt declared that when he got back from New 
Orleans, he would build a steamboat for the navi- 
gation of the Sangamon, and make Abe captain ; 
he would build it with runners for ice, and rollers 
for shoals and dams, for with "Abe in command, 
by thunder, she'd have to go." 

From this point they sped very rapidly down 
the Sangamon and the Illinois. Having con- 
structed curious-looking sails of plank, ''and 
sometimes cloth," they were a ''sight to see," as 
they "rushed through Beardstown," where "the 
people came out and laughed at them." They 
swept by Alton and Cairo, and other considerable 
places, without tying up, but stopped at Memphis, 
Vicksburg, and Natchez. 

SHOCKED BY SLAVERY 

In due time they arrived at New Orleans. 
*'There it was," says John Hanks, "we saw 
negroes chained, maltreated, whipped, and 
scourged. Lincoln saw it ; his heart bled ; said 
nothing much : was silent from feeling ; was sad, 
looked bad, felt bad; was thoughtful and ab- 
stracted. I can say, knowing it, that it was on 
this trip that he formed his opinions of slavery. 
It run its iron in him then and there — May, 1831. 
I have heard him say so often and often." 



JOHN AND ABE 

Abe never worked again in company with his 
friend and relative, good old John Hanks. Here 
their paths separated : Abe's began to ascend the 
heights, while John's continued along the com- 
mon level. They were in the Black Hawk War 



48 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

during the same campaign, but not in the same 
division. But they corresponded, and from 1833 
met at least once a year, till Abe was elected 
President. Then Abe, delighting to honor those 
of his relatives who were worthy of it, invited 
John to go with him to see his stepmother. John 
also went to the inauguration at Washington, 
and tells, with pardonable pride, how he ''was in 
his [Abe's] rooms several times." He then re- 
tired to his old home in Macon County, until the 
assassination and the great funeral, when he 
came to Springfield to look in the blackened face 
of his old friend, and witness the last ceremonies 
of his splendid burial, 

AT NEW SALEM 

When Denton Offutt's boat arrived there. New 
Salem was in the second year of its existence, and 
had then quite a population. So notable and un- 
usual an occurrence as a flatboat, and especially 
one fast on their mill-dam, aroused the curiosity 
of the citizens, and brought the entire hamlet to 
the river banks, where Lincoln, in the role of 
commander, was the most conspicuous object. 
So he was not forgotten, when, in August there- 
after, he walked into the town with a bundle in 
a handkerchief slung across his shoulder, and 
joined the little knot of idlers sitting on the 
"shady side of Hill's store. He opened out his 
Pandora's box of jokes, affiliated with the crowd 
at once, and, "as the setting sun cast his length- 
ened shadow athwart the little village, it showed 
no sign of his parting from them." 

Lincoln gave no intimation as to what brought 
him there, but soon endeared himself to all by 



EARLY LIFE hV ILLINOIS 49 

exhibiting great muscular strength, bonhomie, 
and his propensity to entertain by anecdote. 

The country about New Salem was not very 
important in a commercial sense, but in the vil- 
lage were four "general stores" — stores in which 
almost everything needed in such a community 
was kept for sale. The town flourished — at least, 
survived — about through the period that Lincoln 
dwelt there, after which it disappeared. Lincoln 
was ready to take any work that would get him a 
living. The success of the expedition to New 
Orleans had won the admiration of Offutt, who 
gave Lincoln a clerkship in his store. 

A WRESTLING MATCH 

Ofifutt's admiration of the young clerk did him 
credit, but his voluble expression of it was not 
judicious. He bragged that Lincoln was smart 
enough to be President, and that he could run 
faster, jump higher, throw farther, and "wrastle" 
better than any man in the country. In the 
neighborhood was a gang of rowdies, kind at 
heart but very rough, known as ''the Clary's 
Grove boys." They put up a giant, Jack Arm- 
strong, as their champion against Abe, and ar- 
ranged a ''wrastling" match. When Lincoln 
seemed to be getting the better of his antagonist, 
the "boys" crowded in and interfered, while 
Armstrong attempted a foul. Lincoln was furi- 
ous. Putting forth all his strength he lifted Jack 
up and shook him as a terrier shakes a rat. The 
crowd set out to mob Abe, who backed up against 
a wall and awaited the onset. Armstrong was 
the first to recover his good sense. Exclaim- 
ing, "Boys, Abe Lincoln's the best fellow that 



50 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

ever broke into the settlement," he held out his 
hand to Lincoln, who received it with perfect 
g'ood nature. From that day these boys never 
lost their admiration for him. 



KEEPING STORE 

Some anecdotes connected with his work in the 
store are worth preserving because they illustrate 
traits of his character. He once sold a half- 
pound of tea to a customer. The next morning, 
as he was tidying up the store, he saw, by the 
weights which remained in the scales, that he had 
inadvertently given her four, instead of eight, 
ounces. He instantly weighed out the balance 
and carried it to her, not waiting for his break- 
fast. 

At another time, when he counted up his cash 
at night, he discovered that he had charged a 
customer an excess of six and a quarter cents. 
He closed up the store at once and walked to the 
home of the customer and returned the money. 

One incident illustrates his chivalry. While he 
was waiting upon some women, a ruffian came 
into the store using vulgar language. Lincoln 
asked him to desist, but he became more abusive 
than ever. After the women had gone, Lincoln 
took him out of the store, threw him on the 
ground, rubbed smartweed in his face and eyes 
till he howled for mercy, and then he gave the 
fellow a lecture that did him more good than a 
volume of Chesterfield's letters would have done. 

Some time after Offutt's store had ''winked 
out," while Lincoln was looking for employment 
there came a chance to buy a half-interest in 
another store, the other half being owned by an 



EARLY LIFE IN ILLINOIS 51 

idle, dissolute fellow named Berry, who ulti- 
mately drank himself into his grave. Later, an- 
other opening came in the following way : The 
store of one Radford had been wrecked by the 
horse-play of a party of ruffians, and the lot was 
bought by a Mr. Greene for four hundred dol- 
lars. He employed Lincoln to make an invoice of 
the goods and he in turn offered Greene two hun- 
dred and fifty dollars for the bargain and the 
offer was accepted. But that was not the last 
investment. The fourth and only remaining store 
in the hamlet was owned by one Rutledge. This 
also was bought out by the firm of Berry & Lin- 
coln. Thus they came to have the monopoly of 
the mercantile business in the hamlet of New 
Salem. 

PROMISSORY NOTES 

In all these transactions not a dollar in money 
changed hands. Men bought with promissory 
notes and sold for the same consideration. The 
mercantile venture was not successful. Berry was 
drinking and loafing, and Lincoln, who did not 
work as faithfully for himself as for another, 
was usually reading or telling stones. So when 
a couple of strangers, Trent by name, offered to 
buy out the store, the offer was accepted and 
more promissory notes changed hands. About 
the time these last notes came due, the Trent 
brothers disappeared between two days. Then 
Berry died. 

Lincoln was left with an assortment of promis- 
sory notes. With one exception his creditors told 
him to pay when he was able. He promised to 
put all of his earnings, in excess of modest living 
expenses, into the payment of these obligations. 



52 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

It was the burden of many years and he always 
called it "the national debt." But he kept his 
word, paying- both principal and the high rate 
of interest till 1848. Then after fifteen years, 
when a member of Congress, he paid the last 
•cent. 

His only further experience in navigation was 
the piloting of a Cincinnati steamboat up the 
Sangamon River (during the high water in 
springtime), to show that that stream was 
navigable. Nothing came of it, however, and 
Springfield was never made the head of naviga- 
tion, as some had hoped to see it become. 

HOW HE SAVED A DOG 

One day, when the Lincoln family were on the 
journey to their Illinois home, Abraham per- 
formed a characteristic act that shows his tender- 
ness of heart. It is related by William H. Hern- 
don. Lincoln said the ground had not yet yielded 
up the frosts of winter ; that during the day the 
roads would thaw out on the surface, and at night 
freeze over again, thus making traveling, espe- 
cially with oxen, painfully slow and tiresome. 
There were, of course, no bridges, and the 
party were consequently driven to ford the 
streams, unless by a circuitous route they could 
avoid them. In the early part of the day the 
latter were also frozen slightly, and the oxen 
v^ould break through a square yard of thin ice at 
every step. Among other things which the party 
brought with them was a pet dog, which trotted 
along after the wagon. One day the little fellow 
fell behind and failed to catch up until after they 
had crossed the stream. Missing him, they 



EARLY LIFE IN ILLINOIS 53 

looked back, and there on the opposite bank he 
stood, whining and jumping about in great dis- 
tress. The water was running over the broken 
edges of the ice, and the poor animal was afraid 
to cross. It would not pay to turn the oxen and 
wagon back to ford the stream again in order to 
recover a dog, so the majority, in their anxiety to 
move forward, decided to go on without him. 

"But I could not endure the idea of abandoning 
even a dog," said Lincoln. "Pulling off shoes 
and socks, I waded across the stream and tri- 
umphantly returned with the shivering animal un- 
der my arm. His frantic leaps of joy and other 
evidences of a dog's gratitude amply repaid me 
for all the exposure I had undergone." 

THE rail-splitter's JEANS 

According to George Close, the partner of Lin- 
coln in the rail-splitting business, who is cited 
by William D. Howells, Lincoln was at this time 
a farm laborer, working from day to day, for 
different people, chopping wood, mauling rails, 
or doing whatever was to be done. The country 
was poor, and hard work was the common lot ; 
the heaviest share fell to young unmarried men, 
with whom it was a continual struggle to earn 
a livelihood. Lincoln and Close made about one 
thousand rails together for James Hawks and 
William Miller, receiving their pay in homespun 
clothing. Lincoln's bargain with Miller's wife 
was that he should have one yard of brown jeans 
(richlv dyed with walnut bark) for every four 
hundred rails made, until he should have enough 
for a pair of trousers. As Lincoln was already 
of great altitude, the number of rails that went 



54 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

to the acquirement of his pantaloons was neces- 
sarily immense. 

"the big snow" 

The new settlers did indeed escape the milk- 
sickness, but they encountered a disease which 
was nearly as bad. The fall of 1830 was an un- 
usually severe season for chills and fever, and 
Thomas and his family were so sorely afflicted 
with it as to become thoroughly discouraged. 
Their sorry little cabin presented a melancholy 
sight : the father and mother both shaking at 
once, and the married daughter, who came to 
minister to their sufferings, not much better off. 
So terribly did they suffer that the father vowed 
a vow that as soon as he got able to travel he 
would ''git out 0' tharT 

The winter season came on and was one of 
"ethereal mildness" up to Christmas, when a ter- 
rible and persistent snowstorm set in, and lasted 
without intermission for forty-eight hours, leav- 
ing between three and four feet on the ground on 
the level, a depth never attained before nor since, 
and remaining so for over two months. Its effect 
upon the rural districts was disastrous : the wheat 
crops were totally ruined ; cattle, hogs, and even 
horses perished ; all sorts of provisions gave out. 
There was no means of getting help from abroad. 
In some places teams would bear up on the crust 
of the snow ; in others, there was no road com- 
munication at all, and athletic men would be com- 
pelled to journey on foot to neighbors for food. 
Many perished on the prairie from cold. Some 
even perished in their houses from hunger. Sel- 
fishness was banished by the common calamity. 



EARLY LIFE IN ILLINOIS 55 

Charity was universal ; the people in the whole in- 
terior district of the State were made kin by that 
one touch of nature — ''the big snow." 

WRESTLING WITH NEEDHAM 

Sometime in June, 1831, Offutt's party, re- 
turning from the South, took passage on a steam- 
boat going up the Mississippi, and remained to- 
gether till they reached St. Louis, where Offutt 
left the others, and Abe, Hanks, and Johnston 
started on foot for the interior of Illinois. At 
Edwardsville, twenty-five miles out, Hanks took 
the road to Springfield, and Abe and Johnston 
took that to Coles County, where Tom Lincoln 
had moved since Abraham's departure from home. 

Scarcely had Abe reached Coles County, and 
begun to think what next to turn his hand to, 
when he received a visit from a famous wrestler, 
one Daniel Needham, who regarded him as a 
growing rival, and had a fancy to try him a fall 
or two. He considered himself "the best man" 
in the county, and the report of Abe's achieve- 
ments filled his big breast with envious pains. 
His greeting was friendly and hearty, but his 
challenge was rough and peremptory. Abe met 
him by public appointment in the ^'greenwood," 
at Wabash Point, where he threw his antagonist 
twice, with such ease that Needham's pride was 
more hurt than his body. 

''Lincoln," said he, **you have thrown me twice, 
but you can't whip me." "Needham," replied 
Abe, "are you satisfied that I can throw you? If 
you are not, and must be convinced through a 
thrashing, I will do that, too, for your sake." 
Needham surrendered with such grace as he 
could command. 



56 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 



INTRODUCTION TO SHAKESPEARE AND BURNS 

There lived at New Salem at this time, and for 
some years afterward, a festive gentleman named 
Kelso, a school-teacher, a merchant, or a vaga- 
bond, according to the run of his somewhat vari- 
able ''luck." When other people got drunk at 
New Salem, it was the usual custom to tussle and 
fight, and tramp each other's toes, and pull each 
other's noses ; but when Kelso got drunk, he as- 
tonished the rustic community with copious quo- 
tations from Robert Burns and William Shake- 
speare — authors little known among the literary 
men of New Salem. 

Besides Shakespeare and Burns, Kelso was 
likewise very fond of fishing, and could catch his 
game when no other man could "get a bite." 
Lincoln hated fishing with all his heart. But it 
is the testimony of the countryside, from Peters- 
burg to Island Grove, that Kelso ''drew Lincoln 
after him by his talk" ; that they became exceed- 
ingly intimate ; that they loitered away whole 
days together, along the banks of the quiet 
streams ; that Lincoln learned to love our "divine 
William" and "Scotia's bard." Finally he and 
Kelso boarded at the same place. 

Kelso disappeared suddenly from New Salem. 
A few faint traces of him have been found in 
Missouri, and but for the humble boy to whom 
he was once a gentle master, no human being 
wo;ild now bestow a thought upon his name. In 
short, as Lincoln himself said, Kelso literally 
"petered out." 



CHAPTER V 

Soldier, Postmaster, and Surveyor 

Abraham Lincoln had grown rapidly in 
favor with the people in and around New Salem. 
He was decidedly the most popular man that ever 
lived there. He could do more to quell a riot, 
compromise a feud, and keep peace among the 
neighbors generally, than any one else ; and these 
were services most agreeable for him to perform. 

HOW HE STUDIED 

His storekeeping duties did not require the 
whole of his time. While in the employ of Offutt, 
hands being scarce, Abe turned in and cut down 
trees, and split enough rails for Offutt to make 
a pen sufficiently large to contain a thousand 
hogs. Here was a fine opportunity to remedy 
some of the defects in his education. He could 
read, write, and cipher as well as most men ; but 
as his popularity was growing daily, and his am- 
bition keeping pace, he feared that he might soon 
be called to act in some public capacity which 
would require him to speak his own language 
with some regard to the rules of grammar — of 
which, according to his own confession, he knew 
nothing at all. He carried his troubles to Mr. 
Graham, the schoolmaster, saying, "I have a no- 
tion to study English grammar." "If you expect 
to go before the public in any capacity," replied 
Mr. Graham, ''I think it the best thing you can 



58 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

do." *'If I had a grammar," replied Abe, "I 
would commence now." There was no grammar 
to be had about New Salem ; but the school- 
master, having kept the run of that species of 
property, gladdened Abe's heart by telling him 
that he knew where there was one. Abe rose 
from the breakfast at which he was sitting, and 
learning that the book was at Vaner's, only six 
miles distant, set off after it as hard as he could 
tramp. He soon returned and announced, with 
great pleasure, that he had it. "He then turned 
his immediate and most undivided attention" to 
the study of it. Sometimes he would lie under a 
shade-tree in front of the store, and pore over the 
book; at other times a customer would find him 
stretched on the counter intently engaged in the 
same way. But the store was a bad place for 
study ; and he was often seen quietly slipping out 
of the village, as if he wished to avoid observa- 
tion, when, if successful in getting off alone, he 
would spend hours in the woods, ''mastering a 
book," or in a state of profound abstraction. He 
continued the habit of sitting up late at night; 
but, as lights were as necessary to his purpose 
as they were expensive, the village cooper per- 
mitted him to sit in his shop, where he burnt 
the shavings, and kept a blazing fire to read by, 
when every one else was in bed. His friends the 
Greenes lent him books; the schoolmaster gave 
him instructions in the store, on the road, or in 
the meadows : every visitor to New Salem who 
made the least pretension to scholarship was way- 
laid by Abe, and required to explain something 
which he could not understand. The result of 
it all was, that the village and the surrounding 
country wondered at his growth in knowledge. 



SOLDIER, POSTMASTER, AND SURVEYOR 59 

and he soon became as famous for the goodness 
of his understanding as for the muscular power 
of his body, and the unfaihng humor of his talk. 

THE BLACK HAWK WAR 

In 1 83 1 the Black Hawk War broke out, and 
the following year saw Lincoln enlisted in a com- 
pany from Sangamon. Notwithstanding his 
want of military experience, he had been elected 
captain of a militia company on the occasion of 
a muster at Clary's Grove the fall before, and 
now his friends put him up for the captaincy of 
this company about to enter active service. Wil- 
liam Kirkpatrick, the candidate against him, made 
a poor showing. Lincoln, it is said, had once 
worked for Kirkpatrick, and suffered some indig- 
nities at his hands. However this may have been, 
when Lincoln had distanced Kirkpatrick, and was 
chosen his captain by the suffrages of men who 
had been intimate with the other long before they 
had ever heard of Abe, he spoke of Kirkpatrick 
spitefully, referred in no gentle terms to some old 
dispute, and said, 'I'll be damned but I've beat 
him!" 

Troops rendezvoused at Beardstown and Rush- 
ville were formed into four regiments and a spy 
battalion. Captain Lincoln's company was at- 
tached to the regiment of Colonel Samuel Thomp- 
son. The whole force was placed under the com- 
mand of General Whiteside. 

THE CAPTAIN FACES HIS MEN 

In "this so-called war, replete with wild inci- 
dents and some massacre," Lincoln, hampered, 
as were other officers, by want of discipline 



6o ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

among the recruits, faithfully performed his 
part, figuring creditably in some exciting epi- 
sodes. 

One day, during the many marches and coun- 
termarches, an old Indian found his way into the 
camp, weary, hungry, and helpless. He pro- 
fessed to be a friend of the whites ; and, although 
it was an exceedingly perilous experiment for one 
of his race, he ventured to throw himself upon 
the mercy of the soldiers. But the men first mur- 
mured, and then broke out into fierce cries for his 
blood. **We have come out to fight the Indians," 
said they, *'and by God we intend to do it !" The 
poor Indian threw down before his assailants a 
soiled and crumpled paper, which he implored 
them to read before his life was taken. It 
was a letter of character and safe-conduct from 
General Cass, pronouncing him a faithful man, 
who had done good service in the cause for 
which this army was enlisted. But it was too late : 
the men refused to read it, or thought it a forgery, 
and were rushing with fury upon the defenceless 
old savage, when Captain Lincoln bounded be- 
tween them and their appointed victim. ''Men,'* 
said he, and his voice for a moment stilled the 
agitation around him, ''this must not be done: 
he must not be shot and killed by us." ''But,'' 
said some of them, "the Indian is a damned spy.'' 
Lincoln knew that his own life was now in only 
less danger than that of the poor creature that 
crouched behind him, but his firmness subdued 
most of the turbulent men. One of them, how- 
ever, a little bolder than the rest, but evidently 
feeling that he spoke for the whole, cried out, 
"This is cowardly on your part, Lincoln!" 
Whereupon the tall Captain looked down con- 



I 



SOLDIER, POSTMASTER, AND SURVEYOR 6i 

temptuously upon these ''soldiers" who would 
have murdered a defenceless old Indian. ''If any 
man thinks I am a coward, let him test it," said 
he. "Lincoln/' responded a new voice, "you are 
larger and heavier than we are." "This you can 
guard against : choose your weapons," returned 
the Captain. There was no more disaffection in 
Lincoln's camp, and the word "coward" was 
never coupled with his name again. He often 
declared that his life and character were both at 
stake, and would probably have been lost, had he 
not at that critical moment forgotten the officer 
and asserted the man. 

CAMPAIGN SPORTS 

"During this short Indian campaign," says a 
participant, "we had some hard times — often 
hungry ; but we had a great deal of sport, espe- 
cially of nights — foot-racing, some horse-racing, 
jumping, telling anecdotes, in which Lincoln beat 
all, keeping up a constant laughter and good 
humor all the time ; among the soldiers some 
card-playing, and wrestling, in which Lincoln 
took a prominent part. I think it safe to say he 
was never thrown in a wrestle. While in the 
army, he kept a handkerchief tied around him 
near all the time for wrestling purposes, and 
loved the sport as well as any one could. He 
was seldom ever beat jumping. During the 
campaign, Lincoln himself was always ready for 
an emergency. He endured hardships like a good 
soldier : he never complained, nor did he fear dan- 
ger. When fighting was expected, or danger ap- 
prehended, Lincoln was the first to say, 'Let's go.^ 
He had the confidence of every man of his com- 



62 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

pany, and they strictly obeyed his orders at a 
word. His company was all young men, and full 
of sport." 

LINCOLN AND GENERAL CASS 

After all, Lincoln did not see much of the war. 
His only ''casualty" came after its close. He had 
been mustered out, and his horse was stolen, so 
that he was compelled to walk most of the way 
home. After the expiration of his term of enlist- 
ment he reenlisted as a private. As he saw no 
fighting, the war was to him almost literally a 
picnic. But in 1848, when he was in Congress, 
the friends of General Cass were trying to make 
political capital out of his alleged military ser- 
vices. This brought from Lincoln a speech that 
showed he had not lost the power of satire which 
he possessed while a lad in Indiana : 

"Did you know, Mr. Speaker, I am a military 
hero? In the days of the Black Hawk War I 
fought, bled, and — came away. I was not at 
Stillman's defeat, but I was about as near it as 
General Cass was to Hull's surrender; and, like 
him, I saw the place very soon afterward. It 
is quite certain I did not break my sword, for I 
had none to break, but I bent my musket pretty 
bad on one occasion. If General Cass went in 
advance of me picking whortleberries, I guess I 
surpassed him in charges on the wild onions. If 
he saw any live fighting Indians, it was more 
than I did,'but I had a good many bloody strug- 
gles with the mosquitoes; and although I never 
fainted from loss of blood, I can truly say I was 
often very hungry. If ever I should conclude to 
doif whatever our Democratic friends may sup- 
pose there is of black-cockade Federalism about 



SOLDIER, POSTMASTER, AND SURVEYOR 63 

me, and thereupon they shall take me up as their 
candidate for the Presidency, I protest that they 
shall not make fun of me, as they have of Gen- 
eral Cass, by attempting to write me into a mili- 
tary hero." 

THE POSTMASTER 

On May 7, 1833, Lincoln was appointed post- 
master at New Salem. His political opinions 
were not extreme ; and the Jackson administra- 
tion could find no man who was at the same time 
more orthodox and equally competent to perform 
the duties of the office. He was not able to rent 
a room, and the business is said to have been car- 
ried on in his hat ; but it appears probable that he 
kept the office in Mr. Hill's store, for Lincoln was 
appointed in place of Hill's partner, John Mc- 
Namar, who had resigned to go east. He held 
the position till late in 1836, when New Salem 
partially disappeared, and the office was removed 
to Petersburg. 

The mail arrived duly once a week, and the 
labors of distributing and delivering it were by 
no means great. But Lincoln was determined 
that the dignity of the place should not sufifer 
while he was the incumbent. He therefore made 
up for the lack of real business by deciphering the 
letters of the uneducated portion of the commu- 
nity, and by reading the newspapers aloud to the 
assembled inhabitants in front of Hill's store. 

When Lincoln quit the office, he owed the Gov- 
ernment a small balance which some obstacle pre- 
vented his placing to the credit of the Post-Office 
Department ; so he wrapped it up in a scrap of 
paper, indicated its ownership by a memorandum, 
and laid it by. When years thereafter an agent 



64 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

of the Department called on him for settlement, 
Lincoln withdrew from a safe place this identi- 
cal parcel, and paid it over. 

His easy good nature was sometimes imposed 
upon by inconsiderate acquaintances ; and Mr. 
Hill relates one of the devices by which he sought 
to stop the abuse. "One Elmore Johnson, an 
ignorant but ostentatious, proud man, used to go 
to Lincoln's post-office every day, — sometimes 
three or four times a day — and inquire, 'Anything 
for me ?' This bored Lincoln, yet it amused him. 
Lincoln fixed a plan— wrote a letter to Johnson as 
coming from a negress in Kentucky, saying many 
good things about oppossum, dances, corn-shuck- 
ings, etc. ; 'John's ! come and see me ; and old 
master won't kick you out of the kitchen any 
more!' Elmore took it out; opened it; couldn't 
read a word; pretended to read it; went away; 
got some friends to read it : they read it correctly ; 
he thought the reader was fooling him, and went 
to others with the same result. At last he said 
he would get Lincoln to read it, and presented it 
to Lincoln. It was almost too much for Lincoln, 
but he read it. The man never asked afterward, 
'Anything here for me ?' " 

THE SURVEYORSHIP 

His "war" service finished, Lincoln had his liv- 
ing to make, a running board-bill to pay, and 
nothing to pay it with. He was, it is true, in the 
hands of excellent friends, so far as the greater 
part of his indebtedness was concerned; but he: 
was industrious by nature, and wanted to be 
working, and paying as he went. He would not 
have forfeited the good opinion of those confiding 



SOLDIER, POSTMASTER, AND SURVEYOR 65 

neighbors for a lifetime of ease and luxury. It 
was therefore a most happy thing for him, and 
he felt it to be so, when he attracted the attention 
of John Calhoun, the Surveyor of Sangamon 
County. 

In the early thirties, when the State of Illinois 
was being settled with great rapidity, the demand 
for surveyors was greater than the supply. John 
Calhoun was in urgent need of a deputy, and 
Lincoln was named as a man likely to be able 
to fit himself for the duties on short notice. He 
was appointed. He borrowed the necessary book 
and went to work in dead earnest to learn the 
science. Day and night he studied till his friends, 
noticing the wearing effect on his health, became 
alarmed. But by the end of six weeks, an almost 
incredibly brief period of time, he was ready for 
work. 

It is certain that his outfit was of the simplest 
description, and there is a tradition that at first, 
instead of a surveyor's chain he used a long, 
straight, wild-grape vine. Those who understand 
the conditions and requirements of surveying in 
early days say that this is not improbable. A 
more important fact is that Lincoln's surveys 
have never been called in question, which is some- 
thing that can be said of few frontier surveyors. 
Though he learned the science in so short a time, 
yet here, as always, he was thorough. 

"Of course," says Lamon, "he made some 
money, merely pay for his work ; but it is a 
remarkable fact that, with his vast knowledge of 
the lands in Sangamon and adjacent counties, he 
never made a single speculation on his own ac- 
count. It was not long until he acquired a con- 
siderable private business." 



(^ ABRAHAM LINCOLN 



SOLD UP 



It was said in the preceding chapter that to the 
holders of Lincohi's notes who consented to await 
his abihty to pay, there was one exception. In 
the latter part of 1834 Lincoln's personal property 
was sold under the hammer, and by due process 
of law, to meet the judgment obtained by Van 
Bergen on a note assigned to him by Radford. 
Everything he had was taken ; but it was the sur- 
veyor's instruments which it hurt him most to 
part with, for by their use he was making a toler- 
able living, and building up a respectable busi- 
ness. This time, however, rescue came from an 
unexpected quarter. A neighbor, James Short, 
bought in the instruments and returned them to 
Lincoln. He never forgot this kindness, and 
when President he appointed Short to an Indian 
agency. 

Lincoln had many residences at New Salem ; in 
fact, there were many homes always eager to wel- 
come him as an inmate. He lived at Bowlin 
Greene's, Jack Armstrong's, Rowan Herndon's, 
and at the tavern kept by James Rutledge. Part 
of the time he slept in the loft over a store ; in- 
deed for a time he slept on the counter of Offutt's 
store. 

AT JACK Armstrong's 

Lincoln had no friend more intimate than Jack 
Armstrong, and none that valued him more 
highly. Until he finally left New Salem for 
Springfield, he "rusticated" occasionally at Jack's 
hospitable cabin, situated "four miles in the 
country," as the polished metropolitans of New 
Salem would say. Jack's wife, Hannah, liked 
Abe, and enjoyed his visits not less than Jack did. 



SOLDIER, POSTMASTER, AND SURVEYOR 67 

''Abe would come out to our house," she says, 
"drink milk, eat mush, corn-bread and butter, 
bring the children candy, and rock the cradle 
while I got him something to eat. I foxed his 
pants ; made his shirts. He has gone with us to 
father's; he would tell stories, joke people, girls 
and boys, at parties. He would nurse babies — 
do anything to accommodate anybody. I had no 
books about my house ; loaned him none. We 
didn't think about books and papers. We 
worked ; had to live. Lincoln has staid at our 
house two or three weeks at a time." 



MORE FEATS OF STRENGTH 

Lincoln was often seen in the old mill on the 
river-bank to lift a box of stones weighing from 
a thousand to twelve hundred pounds. Of course 
it was not done by a straight lift of the hands ; 
he **was harnessed to the box with ropes and 
straps." It was even said he could easily raise a 
barrel of whiskey to his mouth when standing 
upright, and take a drink out of the bung-hole ; 
but of course one cannot believe it. Frequent 
exhibitions of strength doubtless had much to do 
with his unbounded influence over the rougher 
class of men. 



JUDGMENT AND FAIRNESS 

He possessed the judicial quality of mind in a 
degree so eminent, and it was so universally 
recognized, that he never could attend a horse- 
race without being importuned to act as a judge, 
or witness a bet without assuming the responsi- 



68 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

bility of a stakeholder. "In the spring or sum- 
mer of 1832," says Henry McHenry, "I had a 
horse-race with George Warburton. I got Lin- 
coln, who was at the race, to be a judge of the 
race, much against his will and after hard persua- 
sion. Lincoln decided correctly ; and the other 
judge said, 'Lincoln is the fairest man I ever 
had to deal with : if Lincoln is in this country 
when I die, I want him to be my administrator, 
for he is the only man I ever met with that was 
wholly and unselfishly honest.' " 

''honest abe" 

''The year that Lincoln was in Denton Offutt's 
store," says J. G. Holland, "was one of great ad- 
vances in many respects. He had made new and 
valuable acquaintances, read many books, mas- 
tered the grammar of his own tongue, won mul- 
titudes of friends, and become ready for a step 
still further in advance. Those who could appre- 
ciate brains respected him, and those whose ideas 
of a man related to his muscles were devoted to 
him. It was while he was performing the work 
of the store that he acquired the sobriquet, 'Hon- 
est Abe' — a characterization that he never dis- 
honored, and an abbreviation that he never out- 
grew. He was judge, arbitrator, referee, umpire, 
authority, in all disputes, games and matches of 
man-flesh, horseflesh, a pacificator in all quarrels ; 
everybody's friend; the best-natured, the most 
sensible, the best-informed, the most modest and 
unassuming, the kindest, gentlest, roughest, 
strongest, best fellow in all New Salem and the 
region round about." 



SOLDIER, POSTMASTER, AND SURVEYOR 69 

A trifling incident exhibited the force of Lin- 
coln's will and the high estimation in which he 
was held by his followers. There was in Captain 
Henry L. Webb's company from Union Count)'' 
a very strong and athletic man named Nathan M. 
Thompson, nicknamed "Dow" Thompson. The 
question of comparative muscular strength aris- 
ing between him and Lincoln, they resorted to a 
wrestling match, in order to decide it. 

After struggling for a while with no advantage 
either way, Lincoln said : ''This is the strongest 
man I ever met." 

Soon thereafter, amid great and growing ex- 
citement, Lincoln was fairly thrown. This was 
for the first time in his life. The wrestlers took 
hold again, and a second time Lincoln was 
thrown. Instantly a hundred men jerked off 
their coats crying, ''Foul!" An equal number on 
the other side followed suit, crying, ''We'll see if 
it was." 

A deadly fight seemed imminent, but Lincoln 
commanded attention, and said : "Boys, this 
man can throw me fairly, if he didn't do it this 
time; so let us give up that I was beat fairly." 



CHAPTER VI 

Lincoln Enters Politics : State Legislator 

About the year 1832 or 1833, Lamon tells us, 
Lincoln made his first effort at public speaking 
in a debating club of which James Rutledge, the 
founder of New Salem, was president. It was 
organized and held regular meetings. As he arose 
to speak, Lincoln's form towered above the little 
assembly. Both hands were thrust down deep 
in the pockets of his pantaloons. A perceptible 
smile at once lit up the faces of the audience, 
for all anticipated the relation of some humorous 
story. But he opened up the discussion in splen- 
did style, to the great astonishment of his friends. 
As he warmed with his subject, his hands would 
forsake his pockets and would enforce his 
ideas by awkward gestures, but would very 
soon seek their easy resting-places. He pursued 
the question with reason and argument so pithy 
and forcible that all were amazed. The presi- 
dent of the club, at his fireside after the meet- 
ing, remarked to his wife, that there was more 
in Abe's head than wit and fun ; that he was 
already a fine speaker; that all he lacked was 
culture to enable him to reach the high destiny 
which he knew was in store for him. From that 
time Rutledge took a deeper interest in him, and 
soon afterward urged him to announce himself 
as a candidate for the Legislature. This he at 
first declined to do, averring that it was impos- 
sible to be elected. It was suggested that a can- ^ 
70 I 



LINCOLN ENTERS POLITICS n 

vass of the county would bring him prominently 
before the people, and in time would do him 
good. He reluctantly yielded to the solicitations 
of his friends, and made a partial canvass. 

FIRST STUMPING EXPERIENCE 

Lincoln made his first appearance on the 
stump a few miles from Springfield, on the oc- 
casion of a public sale. The sale over, speech- 
making was about to begin, when Lincoln ob- 
served strong symptoms of inattention in his 
audience, who had taken that particular moment 
to engage in what James A. Herndon called ''a 
general fight." Lincoln saw that one of his 
friends was sufifering more than he liked in the 
mclce, and stepping into the crowd, he shoul- 
dered them sternly away from his man, until 
he met a fellow who refused to fall back: him 
he seized by the nape of the neck and the seat 
of his breeches, and tossed him "ten or twelve 
feet easily." After this episode — as character- 
istic of him as of the times — he mounted the 
platform and delivered, with awkward modesty, 
the following speech : 

''Gentlemen and fellow-citizens : I presume 
you all know who I am. I am humble Abraham 
Lincoln. I have been solicited by many friends 
to become a candidate for the Legislature. My 
politics are short and sweet, like the old woman's 
dance. I am in favor of a national bank. I 
am in favor of the internal-improvement system 
and a high protective tarifif. These are my sen- 
timents and political principles. If elected, I 
shall be thankful; if not, it will be all the same." 

In these few sentences he espoused the lead- 



72 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

ing principles of the Whig party — Clay's 
■^'American System" — in full. In his view the 
internal-improvement system required the dis- 
tribution of the proceeds of the sales of the pub- 
he lands among the States. 

His friend A. Y. Ellis, who was with him 
during a part of this campaign, says: "He wore 
a mixed jeans coat, claw-hammer style, short in 
the sleeves, and bobtail — in fact, it was so short 
in the tail he could not sit on it — flax and tow 
linen pantaloons, and a straw hat. I think he 
wore a vest, but do not remember how it looked. 
He then wore pot-metal boots." 

ELECTIONEERING METHODS 

The young candidate's methods of election- 
eering are thus described by Miss Tarbell : 
^'Wherever he saw a crowd of men he joined 
them, and he never failed to adapt himself to 
their point of view in asking for votes. If the 
degree of physical strength was the test for a 
candidate, he was ready to lift a weight, or 
wrestle with the countryside champion; if the; 
amount of grain a man could cut would recom- 
mend him, he seized the cradle and showed the; 
swath he could cut." Row Herndon gives an 
instance of the last-named mode of candidating: 
■"He came to my house, near Island Grove, dur- 
ing harvest. There were some thirty men in the 
field. He got his dinner, and went out m thei 
field where the men were at work. I gave him 
an introduction, and the boys said that they; 
could not vote for a man unless he could make 
a hand. 'Well, boys,' said he, 'if that is all, I 
am sure of your votes.' He took hold of the 



LINCOLN ENTERS POLITICS 73" 

cradle, and led the way all the round with per- 
fect ease. The boys were satisfied, and I don't 
think he lost a vote in the crowd. 

''The next day," continues Herndon, "he was 
speaking at Berlin. He went from my house 
with Dr. Barnett, [who] had asked me who this 
man Lincoln was. I told him that he was a 
candidate for the Legislature. He laughed and 
said, 'Can't the party raise no better material 
than that?' I said, 'Go to-morrow, and hear all 
before you pronounce judgment.' When he 
came back, I said, 'Doctor, what say you now?* 
'Why, sir,' said he, 'he is a perfect take-in : he 
knows more than all of them put together.' " 

Lincoln had but ten days to devote to the can- 
vass. The time was insufhcient, and he was 
defeated. The vote against him was chiefly in 
the outlying region where he was little known. 
It must have been gratifying to him that in his 
own precinct, where he was so well knowil, he 
received the almost unanimous vote of all par- 
ties. Biographers differ as to the precise num- 
ber of votes in the New Salem precinct, but by 
Nicolay and Hay it is given as 277 for Lincoln 
and three against him. Of this election Lincoln 
himself (speaking in the third person) said: 
"This was the only time Abraham was ever de- 
feated on the direct vote of the people." 

His next political experience was as candidate 
for the Legislature in 1834. As before, he an- 
noujiced his own candidacy. But this time he 
made a diligent canvass of the district. When 
the election came off he was not only successful 
but ran ahead of his ticket. 



74 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 



EXCHANGE OF COMPLIMENTS 

One day In 1832, while Lincoln was "clerk- 
ing" for Offiitt, a stranger came into the store, 
and soon disclosed the fact that his name was 
Smoot. Abe was behind the counter at the mo- 
ment; but, hearing the name, he sprang over 
and introduced himself. Abe had often heard 
of Smoot, and Smoot had often heard of Abe. 
They had been as anxious to meet as ever two 
celebrities were ; but hitherto they had never 
been able to manage it. *'Smoot," said Lincoln, 
after a steady survey of his person, "I am very 
much disappointed in you : I expected to see an 
old Probst of a fellow." (Probst, it appears, 
was the most hideous specimen of humanity in 
all that country.) *'Yes," replied Smoot; "and 
I am equally disappointed, for I expected to see 
a good-looking man when I saw you." A few 
neat compliments like the foregoing laid the 
foundation of a lasting intimacy between the 
two men. 

''After he was elected to the Legislature," 
says Smoot, ''he came to my house one day in 
company with Hugh Armstrong. Says he, 
'Smoot, did you vote for me?' I told him I did. 
'Well,' says he, 'you must loan me money to buy 
suitable clothing, for I want to make a decent 
appearance in the Legislature.' I then loaned 
him two hundred dollars, which he returned to 
me according to promise." , 



VOCATION SETTLED 

Though Lincoln probably did not realize it, 
this election put an end forever to his drifting, 

i 



LINCOLN ENTERS POLITICS 75 

desultory, frontier life. Up to this point he was 
always looking for a job. From this time on 
he was not passing from one thing to another. 
In this country politics and law are closely allied. 
This twofold pursuit, politics for the sake of 
law, and law for the sake of politics, consti- 
tuted Lincoln's vocation for the rest of his life. 



VANDALIA AND THE VANDALIANS 

The capital of Illinois at this time was Van- 
dalia, a village said to be named after the Van- 
dals by innocent citizens who were pleased with 
the euphony of the word but did not know who 
the Vandals were. Outwardly the village was 
rough and forbidding, and many of the Solons 
were attired in coonskin caps and other rude 
apparel. The fashionable clothing, which came 
to be generally adopted as men grew "genteel," 
was blue jeans. Even these ''store clothes" were 
as yet comparatively unknown. 

But one must not be misled by appearances in 
a frontier town. Frontier life has a marvelous 
influence in developing brains. In the collection 
of men at Vandalia were more than a few who 
afterward came to have national influence and 
reputation. 

LINCOLN AND DOUGLAS 

Apart from Lincoln himself, the most promi- 
nent member of the Legislature was his antago- 
nist, Stephen A. Douglas, whom perhaps no man 
in the history of our political system ever sur- 
passed in astuteness. The personal appearance 
of Douglas, who was five feet and one inch 
high, and then weighed about one hundred 



76 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

pounds, greatly amused Lincoln. Douglas was 
active, adroit, and insinuating, and Lincoln pro- 
nounced him to be "the least man he ever saw," 
little dreaming of the time to come, when this 
same dwarf was to bear him on his shoulders 
to the Executive Mansion. 

LEGISLATIVE CAREER COMPLETED 

Lincoln was reelected to the Legislature as 
often as he was willing to be a candidate, and 
served continuously for eight years. One ses- 
sion was much like another, and of his legis- 
lative experience only two prominent facts need 
be narrated. One was the removal of the capi- 
tal to Springfield. To Lincoln was entrusted 
the difficult task of accomplishing this — difficult, 
because there were almost as many claims for 
the honor of being the capital city as there were 
towns and villages in the central part of the 
State. He was entirely successful, and thence- 
forward he was inseparably connected with 
Springfield. It was his home as long as he lived, 
and there his remains were buried. 

The prophetic event of his legislative work 
was what is known as the Lincoln-Stone pro- 
test. This looks to-day so harmless that it is 
not easy to understand the situation in 1837. 
The pro-slavery feeling was running high ; an 
abolitionist was looked on as a monster and a 
menace to national law and order. It was in 
that year that the Reverend Elijah P. Love joy 
was murdered^ — martyred — at Alton, 111. The 
Legislature had passed pro-slavery resolutions. 
There were many in the Legislature who did 
not approve of these, but in the condition of 



LINCOLN ENTERS POLITICS 77 

public feeling It was regarded as political sui- 
cide to express opposition openly. There was 
no politic reason why Lincoln should protest. 
His protest could do no practical good. To 
him it was solely a matter of conscience. Slav- 
ery was wrong, the resolutions were wrong, and 
to him it became necessary to enter the protest. 
He succeeded in getting but one man to join 
him, and he did so because he was about to with- 
draw from politics and therefore had nothing 
to lose. Here is the dodiment as it was spread 
on the journal : 

''Resolutions upon the subject of domestic slav- 
ery having passed both branches of the General 
Assembly at its present session, the undersigned 
hereby protest against the passage of the same. 

"They believe that the institution of slavery 
is founded on both injustice and bad policy, but 
that the promulgation of abolition doctrines 
tends rather to increase than abate its evils. 

''They believe that the Congress of the United 
States has no power under the Constitution to 
interfere with the institution of slavery in the 
different States. 

"They believe that the Congress of the United 
States has the power, under the Constitution, to 
abolish slavery in the District of Columbia, but 
that the power ought not to be exercised, unless 
at the request of the people of the District. 

"The difference between these opinions and 
those contained in the above resolutions is their 
reason for entering this protest. 

(Signed) "Dan Stone, 
"A. Lincoln, 
^'Representatives from the county of Sanga- 
mon." 



78 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 



LIGHTNING-ROD POLITICS 

In 1836 Lincoln made an electioneering speech 
which was fortunately heard by Joshua Speed, 
and he has given an account of it. At that time 
lightning-rods were rare and attracted an un- 
reasonable amount of attention. George For- 
quer, a man of wealth and ability, who had been 
a Whig, but had turned his coat and received 
the appointment of Register of the Land Office, 
was Lincoln's opponeht. He had recently rodded 
his house — and every one knew it. This man 
made a speech partly in ridicule of Lincoln, his 
bigness, his awkwardness, his dress, his youth. 
Lincoln heard him through without interruption, 
then took the stand and said : 

''The gentleman commenced his speech by say- 
ing that this young man would have to be taken 
down, and he was sorry the task devolved upon 
him. I am not so young in years as I am in the 
tricks and trades of a politician ; but live long or 
die young, I would rather die now than, like the 
gentleman, change my politics and simultaneous 
with the change receive an office worth three 
thousand dollars a year, and then have to erect a 
lightning-rod over my house to protect a guilty 
conscience from an offended God." 

It need hardly be said that that speech clung 
to its victim like a bur. Wherever he went, 
some one would be found to tell about the guilty 
conscience and the lightning-rod. The house 
and its lightning-rod were long a centre of in- 
terest in Springfield. Visitors to the city were 
taken to see the house and its lightning-rod, 
while the story was told with great relish. 



LINCOLN ENTERS POLITICS 79 



HOW LINCOLN SUCCEEDED 

In no element of political controversy did Lin- 
coln fail during this canvass. He was, as there- 
after, clear and skilful in statement and logical 
in discussion ; he generally preserved his equa- 
nimity and good humor, and discomfited his 
enemies, but when it was apparent that forbear- 
ance had ceased to be a virtue, Lincoln made 
points and gained friends by the force, spirit, 
and defiance of his replies. In his first and sec- 
ond canvass he was bashful and timid, and con- 
fined himself to the strictly rural districts ; this 
time he put away his maiden reserve, and spoke 
as unrestrainedly at Springfield as at New 
Salem. He gained the approval and applause 
of his friends and the respect and fear of his 
enemies, and became, by that very canvass, a 
leader of his party in Sangamon County, which 
distinction he never lost. 



THE LONG NINE 

Of the Sangamon County legislators chosen 
at this time, seven Representatives, including 
Lincoln, and two Senators, were men over six 
feet in height. This group became kno\yn as the 
''Long Nine" and was otherwise distinguished 
in what was a remarkable legislative body. One 
member of the ''Long Nine" was Robert L. Wil- 
son, from whom, as quoted by Henry C. Whit- 
ney, we have the following description of Lin- 
coln. 



So ABRAHAM LINCOLN 



A BORN POLITICIAN 



"From Mr. Wilson," says Whitney, "whom I 
knew intimately in after life, I learned much of 
the career of the great President in those early 
days. Wilson said : 'Lincoln was a natural de- 
bater ; he was always ready and always got right 
down to the merits of his case, without any non- 
sense or circumlocution. He was quite as much 
at home in the Legislature as at New Salem ; he 
had a quaint and peculiar way, all his own, of 
treating a subject, and he frequently startled us 
by his modes — but he was always right. He 
seemed to be a born politician. We followed his 
lead, but he followed nobody's lead ; he hewed 
the way for us to follow, and we gladly did so. 
He could grasp and concentrate the matters un- 
der discussion, and his clear statement of an 
intricate or obscure subject was better than an 
ordinary argument. It may almost be said that 
he did our thinking for us, but he had no arro- 
gance, nothing of the dictatorial ; it seemed the 
right thing to do as he did. He excited no envy 
or jealousy. He was felt to be so much greater 
than the rest of us that we were glad to abridge 
our intellectual labors by letting him do the 
general thinking for the crowd. He inspired 
absolute respect, although he was utterly care- 
less and negligent. We would ride while he 
would walk, but we recognized him as a master 
in logic ; he was poverty itself when I knew him, 
but still perfectly independent. He would bor- 
row nothing and never ask favors. He seemed 
to glide along in life without any friction or 
effort.' " 



LINCOLN ENTERS POLITICS 8i 



A TILT WITH TAYLOR 

The campaign above dwelt on was a vituper- 
ative one. Whitney's account, which here fol- 
lows, is graphic enough to bring the times and 
the men clearly before us. Among the Demo- 
cratic orators was Edmund D. Taylor, a pro- 
fessional politician, having held office for most 
of his life ; in fact, both he and his brother had 
a weakness for land-office appointments, and 
one or the other, and sometimes both, were con- 
stantly feeding, in some way, at the public crib. 

So Taylor, in one of his speeches, took occa- 
sion to appeal to the prejudices of the people by 
calling the Whigs "English aristocrats," and 
speaking of them as bankers, capitalists, toadies 
to the English, etc., and to laud his party as the 
lover of the poor man, plain manners, honest 
workmen, etc. In point of fact, Taylor himself, 
with a strange inconsistency of conduct, was a 
consummate fop. He never appeared in public 
without a ruffled shirt, a blue coat and brass but- 
tons, and a gold-headed cane. This habit he 
persisted in to his ninetieth year, when, with his 
oiled and glossy locks and erect deportment, he 
would easily pass for a youth of sixty. When 
Taylor had concluded this demagogic appeal, 
Lincoln caught the lower edge of his vest and 
suddenly jerked it open, exhibiting a huge ruffled 
shirt and a ponderous gold watch-chain with a 
lot of ornamental appendages, which Taylor had 
designed to conceal for the occasion, to the dire 
confusion of Taylor and the infinite merriment 
of the crowd. Then Lincoln "sailed into" the 
pretensions launched forth by Taylor, in this 
style : "And here's Dick Taylor charging us with 



82 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

aristocracy and gilt manners, and claiming to be 
an exponent of the farmers and cattle-raisers ; 
and while he's doing this, he stands in a hundred- 
dollar suit of clothes in a dancing master's pomp 
and parade, with a ruffled shirt just such as his 
master. General Jackson, wears, and a gold log- 
chain around his neck to keep his watch from 
being stole by some of us, and with a big gold- 
headed cane. And while he was raised in this 
style, I was a-steering a flatboat down the river 
for eight dollars a month, with a torn shirt, one 
pair of buckskin breeches, and a zvarmus as my 
only suit. The Bible says, *By their fruits ye 
shall know them' ; now I have got on my best 
to-day, and Taylor has got on his shabbiest. 
You can judge which one of us is the aristocrat 
by our appearance." 

THE "skinning OF THOMAS" 

Jesse B. Thomas, a leader of the Democracy, 
in the absence of Lincoln made a good deal of 
sport of him, which some friends of the latter 
reported in time for him to reach the meeting 
before it broke up. As soon as Thomas had 
concluded, there were vociferous shouts for Lin- 
coln from all over the house. He was on hand. 
Having heard of Thomas's line of remark, he 
was wrought up to his extremest tension, and 
abused Thomas in a merciless way. He mim- 
icked Thomas perfectly, showed off all his pecul- 
iarities and weaknesses, and kept the audience 
in a roar of derision at poor Thomas, who was 
in full view during the whole scene, and could 
not escape. It was a long time before this in- 
cident, called the ''skinning of Thomas," was 



I 



LINCOLN ENTERS POLITICS 83 

forgotten in Springfield ; but Lincoln himself, to 
whose nature the attack was entirely foreign, 
after it was over felt very sorry for it, and even 
went so far as to apologize to Thomas. 

-LEAVING NEW SALEM 

The time came at last when Mr. Lincoln must 
leave the place where he had lived for nearly 
six years — where he had evolved from a mere 
adventurer to a lawyer and a legislator. He had 
served two terms in the Legislature, and had 
acquired considerable distinction ; he had seen the 
rise, growth, development and decay of New Sa- 
lem ; and he probably foresaw its speedy down- 
fall, for Petersburg had been established, and was 
growing at the expense of the earlier settlement. 

And so, immediately after the adjournment 
of the Legislature in March, 1837, Lincoln sold 
his compass, chain, marking-pins, and Jacob's 
staff; packed his little clothing and few effects 
into his saddle-bags, borrowed a horse of his 
friend Bowlin Greene and bade adieu to the 
scene of so much of life, so much of sorrow, to 
him. Li less than a year from that time New 
Salem ceased to exist. 

When Bowlin Greene died, Lincoln was in- 
vited by the Masons, under whose auspices 
Greene was buried, to make a funeral address ; 
he manfully attempted it and ignominiously 
failed. His feelings overpowered him as the 
past rose in his memory, and the disinterested 
affection of his departed friend passed in review 
before him ; his sobs choked his utterance, and 
he withdrew from the mournful scene to accom- 
pany Mrs. Greene to her desolate home. 



CHAPTER VII 

Lincoln as a Lawyer 

Since the versatile powers of Abraham Lin- 
coln have come to be better understood by those 
who have made a special study of his life, his 
legal experience has been treated as not the least 
important part of the training that fitted him for 
his supreme task. Lamon tells interesting things 
about this phase of Lincoln's career. 

READING LAW 

He began to read law while he lived with 
Herndon. Some of his acquaintances insist that 
he began even earlier than this, and assert, by 
way of proof, that he was known to borrow a 
w^ell-worn copy of Blackstone from A. V. 
Bogue, a pork-dealer at Beardstown. At all 
events, he now went to work in earnest, and 
studied law as faithfully as if he had never 
dreamed of any other business in life. As a 
matter of course, his slender purse was unequal 
to the purchase of the needful books. This cir- 
cumstance, however, gave him little trouble ; for, 
although he was short of funds, he was long in 
the legs, and had nothing to do but to walk off 
to Springfield, where his friend, John T. Stuart, 
cheerfully loaned him books. Mr. Stuart's part- 
ner, H. C. Dummer, says, "He was an uncouth- 
looking lad, did not say much, but what he did 
say he said straight and sharp." 
84 



LINCOLN AS A LAWYER 85 

"He used to read law," says Henry McHenry, 
*'in 1832 or 1833, barefooted, seated in the shade 
of a tree, and would grind around with the 
shade, just opposite Berry's grocery-store, a few 
feet south of the door." He occasionally varied 
the attitude by lying flat on his back, and "put- 
ting his feet lip the tree" — a situation which 
might have been unfavorable to mental applica- 
tion in the case of a man with shorter ex- 
tremities. 

"The first time I ever saw Abe with a law 
book in his hand," says Squire Godbey, "he was 
sitting astride of Jake Bales's woodpile in New 
Salem. Says I, 'Abe, what are you studying?' 
'Law,' says Abe. 'Great God Almighty!' re- 
sponded I." It was too much for Godbey : he 
could not suppress the blasphemy at seeing such a 
figure acquiring science in such an odd situation. 

Minter Graham asserts that Abe did a little 
''of what we call sitting up to the fine gals of 
Illinois" ; but, according to other authorities, he 
always had his book with him "when in com- 
pany," and would read and talk alternately. He 
carried it along in his walks to the woods and 
the river ; read it in daylight under the shade- 
tree by the grocery, and at night by any friendly 
light he could find. 

Abe's progress in the law was as surprising 
as the intensity of his application to study. He 
never lost a moment that might be improved. 
It is even said that he read and recited to him- 
self on the road and by the wayside as he came 
down from Springfield with the books he had 
borrowed from Stuart. The first time he went 
up he had "mastered" forty pages of Blackstone 
before he got back. 



86 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 



PRELIMINARY PRACTICE 

It was not long until, with his restless desire 
to be doing something practical, he began to 
turn his acquisitions to account in forwarding 
the business of his neighbors. He wrote deeds, 
contracts, notes, and other legal papers for 
them, ''using a small dictionary and an old 
form-book"; ''pettifogged" incessantly before 
the justice of the peace, and probably assisted 
that functionary in the administration of justice 
as much as he benefited his own clients. This 
species of country "student's" practice was en- 
tered upon very early, and kept up until long 
after he was quite a distinguished man in the 
Legislature. But in all this he was only trying 
himself: as he was not admitted to the bar until 
1837, he did not regard it as legitimate practice, 
and never charged a penny for his services. Al- 
though this fact is mentioned by a great number 
of persons, and the generosity of his conduct 
much enlarged upon, it is seriously to be re- 
gretted that no one has furnished us with a cir- 
cumstantial account of any of his numerous 
cases before the magistrate. 

GENERAL STUDY AND READING 

But Mr. Lincoln did not confine himself en- 
tirely to the law. He was not yet quite through 
with Kirkham nor the schoolmaster. The "valu- 
able copy" of the grammar "he delighted to pe- 
ruse" is still in the possession of R. B. Rutledge, 
with the thumb-marks of the President all over 
it. "He also studied natural philosophy, chem- 
istry, astronomy, etc. He had no regular teacher, 



LINCOLN AS A LAWYER 87 

but perhaps received more assistance from Min- 
ter Graham than from any other person." 

He read with avidity all the newspapers that 
came to New Salem — chiefly the Sangamon 
Journal, the Missouri Republican, and the Louis- 
ville Journal. The last-named was his favorite. 
Its wit and anecdotes were after his own heart, 
and he was a regular subscriber for it through 
several years when he could ill afford a luxury 
so costly. 

LAW PARTNERSHIP 

In the year of his admission to the bar Lincoln 
entered into partnership with John T. Stuart of 
Springfield. Stuart wished to get into politics, 
and it was essential that he should have a trust- 
worthy partner. So the firm of Stuart and Lin- 
coln was established in 1837 and lasted for four 
years. In 1841 Lincoln became a partner of 
Stephen T. Logan, and this connection also 
lasted about four years. In 1845 was established 
the firm of Lincoln and Herndon, which con- 
tinued formally till the President's death. 

After a brief period Lincoln himself got 
deeper into politics, and consequently neglected 
the law more or less. But late in 1848, or early 
in 1849, he returned to the law with renewed 
vigor and zeal, giving it his undivided attention 
for six years. It was the repeal of the Missouri 
Compromise that called him back into the arena 
of politics. 

HOW LINCOLN *'mOVED" 

His partnership with Stuart of course neces- 
sitated his removal to Springfield. This event, 
small in itself, gives such a pathetic picture of 



88 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

his poverty, and his cheerful endurance, that it 
is well worth narrating. It is preserved by- 
Joshua F. Speed, who became, and through life 
continued, Lincoln's fast friend. 

'*He rode into town," says Speed, "on a bor- 
rowed horse, without earthly goods but a pair 
of saddle-bags, two or three law books, and 
some clothing in his saddle-bags. He came into 
my store, set his saddle-bags on the counter, 
and said : 

'* 'Speed, tell me what the furniture for a sin- 
gle bedroom will cost.' 

'*I took my pencil, figured it up, and found it 
would cost seventeen dollars. 

''Lincoln replied : 'It is cheap enough, but I 
want to say, cheap as it is, I have not the money 
to pay. But if you will credit me until Christ- 
mas, and my experiment here is a success, I will 
pay you then. If I fail, I will probably never 
be able to pay you.' 

"The voice was so melancholy, I felt for him." 

Lincoln was evidently suffering from one of 
his fits of depression and sadness. Speed kindly 
replied : 

'T have a very large double bed which you are 
perfectly welcome to share with me, if you 
choose." 

"Where is your bed?" said Lincoln. 

"Up-stairs," replied Speed. 

He took his saddle-bags on his arm, went up- 
stairs, placed them on the floor, and came down, 
laughing, saying: "Speed, I am moved." The 
ludicrous idea of "moving" all his goods and 
chattels, by taking his saddle-bags up-stairs, 
made him as mirthful as he had been melan- 
choly. 



LINCOLN AS A LAWYER 89 

From that time on, Springfield was his home 
until when, twenty- three years thereafter, he left 
his humble residence to occupy the White House 
as President of the United States. When he 
thus settled and became established in the pro- 
fession of the law, Springfield was not a large 
city, but it was a very active one, and was the 
capital of the State. Lincoln was favorably 
known there because, as previously stated, he 
had been chiefly instrumental in getting the 
capital moved to that place from Vandalia. His 
first law partner was very helpful to him, and 
he had abundant reason all his life to be thank- 
ful for the friendship of Joshua F. Speed. 

THE LAWYER AND HIS FEES 

In his law practice Lincoln never could bring 
himself to charge large fees. Lamon, who was 
his limited partner (with the ofiice in Danville 
and Bloomington) for many years, tells one in- 
stance that illustrates this trait. There was a 
case of importance for which the fee was fixed 
in advance at $250, a very moderate fee under 
the circumstances. It so happened that the case 
was not contested, and the business required only 
a short time. The client cheerfully paid the fee 
as agreed. As he went away Lincoln asked his 
partner how much he charged. He replied, 
"$250." "Lamon," he said, "that is all wrong. 
Give him back at least half of it." Lamon pro- 
tested that it was according to agreement and the 
client was satisfied. "That may be, but / am not 
satisfied. This is positively wrong. Go, call him 
back and return him half the mojiey at least, or 
I will not receive one cent of it for my share." 



90 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

The largest fee he ever received was from the 
Ilhnois Central Railroad. The case was tried at 
Bloomington before the Supreme Court, and was 
won for the road. Lincoln went to Chicago and 
presented a bill for $2,000 at the offices of the 
company. "Why," said the official, in real or 
feigned astonishment, "this is as much as a 
first-class lawyer would have charged." 

Lincoln was greatly depressed by this rebuff, 
and would have let the matter drop then and 
there had not his neighbors heard of it. They 
persuaded him to raise the fee to $5,000, and six 
leading lawyers of the State testified that that 
sum was a moderate charge. Lincoln sued the 
road for the larger amount and won his case. It 
is interesting to recall the fact that at that time 
the vice-president of the railroad was George 
B. McClellan. 



CONSCIENCE VERSUS CLIENTAGE 

Lincoln put his conscience into his legal prac- 
tice. He held (with Blackstone) that law is 
for the purpose of securing justice, and he would 
never make use of any technicality for the pur- 
pose of thwarting justice. When others manoeu- 
vered, he met them by straightforward dealing. 
He never did or could take an unfair advantage. 
On the wrong side of a case he was worse than 
useless to his client, and he knew it. He would 
never take such a case if it could be avoided. 
His partner Herndon tells how he gave some 
free and unprofessional advice to one who of- 
fered him such a case : "Yes, there is no reason- 
able doubt but that I can gain your case for you. 
I can set a whole neighborhood at loggerheads; 



I 



LINCOLN AS A LAWYER 91 

I can distress a widowed mother and her six 
fatherless children, and thereby get for you six 
hundred dollars, which rightfully belongs, it 
appears to me, as much to them as it does to 
you. I shall not take your case', but will give 
a little advice for nothing. You seem a spright- 
ly, energetic man. I would advise you to try 
your hand at making six hundred dollars in some 
other way." 

Sometimes, after having entered on a case, he 
discovered that his clients had imposed on him. 
In his indignation he has even left the court- 
room. Once when the judge sent for him he 
refused to return. *'Tell the judge my hands 
are dirty; I came over to wash them." 

Lincoln's self-surrender 

The most important lawsuit in which Lincoln 
was ever engaged was the McCormick case. 
McCormick instituted a suit against one Manny 
for alleged infringement of patents. McCormick 
virtually claimed the monopoly of the manufac- 
ture of harvesting machines. The suit involved 
a large sum of money, besides incidental consid- 
erations. The leading attorney for the plaintiff 
was Reverdy Johnson, one of the foremost at 
the bar in the entire country. It was the oppor- 
tunity of crossing swords with Johnson that 
more than anything else stirred Lincoln's inter- 
est. With him, for the defence, was associated 
Edwin M. Stanton. 

The case was to be tried at Cincinnati, and all 
parties were on hand. Lincoln gave an extraor- 
dinary amount of care to the preparation of the 
case. But some little things occurred. Through 



92 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

an open doorway he heard Stanton make some 
scornful remarks of him — ridicuHng his awk- 
ward appearance, and particularly his dress, for 
Lincoln wore a linen duster, soiled and disfigured 
by perspiration.' When the time came for ap- 
portioning the speeches, Lincoln, although he 
was thoroughly prepared and by the customs of 
the bar it was his right to make the argument, 
courteously offered the privilege to Stanton, who 
promptly accepted. It was a great disappoint- 
ment to Lincoln to miss thus the opportunity of 
arguing with Reverdy Johnson. Neither did 
Stanton know what he missed. Nor did John- 
son know what a narrow escape he had. 

PER CONTRA 

On December 3, 1839, Mr. Lincoln was ad- 
mitted to practice in the Circuit Court of the 
United States ; and on the same day the names 
of Stephen A. Douglas, S. H. Treat, Schuyler 
Strong, and two other gentlemen were placed 
on the same roll. 

The first speech he delivered in the Supreme 
Court of the State was one the like of which 
will never be heard again, and must have led the 
judges to doubt the sanity of the new attorney. 
We give it in the form in which it appears to be 
authenticated by Judge Treat: 

"A case being called for hearing in the Court, 
Mr. Lincoln stated that he appeared for the ap- 
pellant, and was ready to proceed with the argu- 
ment. He then said, 'This is the first case I have 
ever had in this Court, and I have therefore ex- 
amined it with great care. As the Court will 
perceive, by looking at the abstract of the record, 



LINCOLN AS A LAWYER 93 

the only question in the case is one of authority. 
I have not been able to find any authority sus- 
taining my side of the case, but I have found 
several cases directly in point on the other side. 
I will now give these cases, and then submit the 
case.' " 

WAS LINCOLN A GREAT LAWYER? 

For many years Judge David Davis was the 
near friend and the intimate associate of Mr. 
Lincoln. He presided in the court where Lin- 
coln was oftenest heard : year in and year out 
they traveled together from town to town, from 
county to county, riding frequently in the same 
conveyance, and lodging in the same room. We 
may fairly consider him a competent judge of 
the professional character of Mr. Lincoln. 

At Indianapolis, Judge Davis spoke of Lin- 
coln as follows : 

"In all the elements that constitute the great 
lawyer, he had few equals. He was great both 
at nisi priiis and before an appellate tribunal. 
He seized the strong points of a cause, and pre- 
sented them with clearness and great compact- 
ness. His mind was logical and direct, and he 
did not indulge in extraneous discussion. Gen- 
eralities and platitudes had no charms for him. 
An unfailing vein of humor never deserted him; 
and he was always able to chain the attention of 
court and jury, when the cause was the most un- 
interesting, by the appropriateness of his anec- 
dotes. 

"His power of comparison was large, and he 
rarely failed in a legal discussion to use that 
mode of reasoning. The framework of his men- 
tal and moral being was honesty, and a wrong 



94 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

cause was poorly defended by him. The ability 
which some eminent lawyers possess, of explain- 
ing away the bad points of a cause by ingenious 
sophistry, was denied him. In order to bring 
into full activity his great powers, it was neces- 
sary that he should be convinced of the right 
and justice of the matter which he advocated. 
When so convinced, whether the cause was great 
or small, he was usually successful. He read 
law books but little, except when the cause in 
hand made it necessary; yet he was usually self- 
reliant, depending on his own resources, and 
rarely consulting his brother lawyers, either on 
the management of his case or on the legal ques- 
tions involved. 

"He hated wrong and oppression everywhere ; 
and many a man whose fraudulent conduct was 
undergoing review in a court of justice has 
writhed under his terrific indignation and re- 
bukes. He was the most simple and unosten- 
tatious of men in his habits, having few wants, 
and those easily supplied. To his honor be it 
said, that he never took from a client, even when 
the cause was gained, more than he thought the 
service was worth and the client could reason- 
ably afford to pay. The people where he prac- 
tised law were not rich, and his charges were 
always small. 

''When he was elected President, I question 
whether there was a lawyer in the circuit, who 
had been at the bar as long a time, whose means 
were not larger. It did not seem to be one of 
the purposes of his life to accumulate a fortune. 
In fact, outside of his profession, he had no 
knowledge of the way to make money, and he 
never even attempted it." 



LINCOLN AS A LAWYER 95 



WORSTED IN A HORSE-TRADE 

When Lincoln was a young lawyer in Illinois, 
he and a certain judge got to bantering each 
other about trading horses ; and it was agreed 
that the next morning at nine o'clock they should 
make a trade, the horses to be unseen up to 
that hour, and no backing out, under a forfeiture 
of twenty-five dollars. 

At the hour appointed, the judge came up, 
leading the "sorriest" looking specimen of a 
horse ever seen in those parts. In a few min- 
utes Mr. Lincoln was seen approaching with a 
wooden sawhorse on his shoulder. 

Loud were the shouts and laughter of the 
crowd, and both were greatly increased when 
Lincoln, on surveying the judge's animal, set 
down the sawhorse and exclaimed : 

"Well, Judge, this is the first time I ever got 
the worst of it in a horse-trade." 



SETTLING AN ANCIENT CONTROVERSY 

Whenever the people of Lincoln's neighbor- 
hood engaged in dispute ; whenever a bet was to 
be decided ; when they differed on points of re- 
ligion or politics ; when they wanted to get out 
of trouble, or desired advice regarding anything 
on the earth, below it, above it, or under the sea, 
they went to "Abe." 

Two fellows, after a hot dispute lasting some 
hours, over the problem as to how long a man's 
legs should be in proportion to the size of his 
body, stamped into Lincoln's office one day and 
put the question to him. 

Lincoln listened gravely to the arguments ad- 



96 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

vanced by both contestants, spent some time in 
^'reflecting" upon the matter, and then, turning 
around in his chair and facing the disputants, 
deHvered his opinion with all the gravity of a 
judge sentencing a fellow-being to death. 

"This question has been a source of contro- 
versy,'' he said, slowly and deliberately, "for un- 
told ages, and it is about time it should be 
definitely decided. It has led to bloodshed in 
the past, and there is no reason to suppose it 
will not lead to the same in the future. 

"After much thought and consideration, not 
to mention mental worry and anxiety, it is my 
opinion, all side issues being swept away, that a 
man's lower limbs, in order to preserve harmony 
of proportion, should be at least long enough to 
reach from his body to the ground." 

AN AD CAPTANDUM VICTORY 

Once, when Lincoln was pleading a case, the 
opposing lawyer had all the advantage of the 
law ; the weather was warm, and his opponent, 
as was permissible in frontier courts, pulled off 
his coat and vest as he grew warm in the argu- 
ment. 

At that time shirts with buttons behind were 
unusual. Lincoln took in the situation at once. 
Knowing the prejudices of the primitive people 
against pretension of all sorts, or any affectation 
of superior social rank, he arose and said : 

"Gentlemen of the jury, having justice on my 
side, I don't think you will be at all influenced 
by the gentleman's pretended knowledge of the 
law, when you see he does not even know which 
side of his shirt should be in front." 



LINCOLN AS A LAIVYL 97 

There was a general laugh, and Lincoln's case 
was won. 

EQUITY AGAINST TECHNICALITY 

A lawyer who studied in Mr. Lincoln's office 
tells a story illustrative of the tenderness of 
Lincoln's conscience. After listening one day 
for some time to a client's statement of his case, 
Lincoln, who had been staring at the ceiling, 
suddenly swung round in his chair and said: 

''Well, you have a pretty good case in tech- 
nical law, but a pretty bad one in equity and 
justice. You'll have to get some other fellow 
to win this case for you. I couldn't do it. All 
the time, while talking to that jury, Ld be think- 
ing: 'Lincoln, you're a liar,' and I believe I 
should forget myself and say it out loud." 



CHAPTER VIII 
Life on the Circuit 

Lamon tells us that "when Mr. Lincoln first 
began to 'ride the circuit,' he was too poor to 
own horse-flesh or vehicle, and was compelled 
to borrow from his friends. But in due time he 
became the proprietor of a horse, which he fed 
and groomed himself, and to which he was very 
much attached. On this animal he would set 
out from home, to be gone for weeks together, 
with no baggage but a pair of saddle-bags, con- 
taining a change of linen, and an old cotton um- 
brella to shelter him from sun or rain. When 
he got a little more of this world's goods, he 
set up a one-horse buggy — a very sorry and 
shabby-looking affair, which he generally used 
when the weather promised to be bad. But 
the lawyers were always glad to see him, and 
the landlords hailed his coming with pleas- 
ure." 

Courts lasted nearly six months in the year, 
and the judge and lawyers generally contrived 
to spend as many Sundays at home as they 
could. Lincoln did not join in this effort, but 
when he set out on a tour of the circuit, gen- 
erally continued till the end. 

PLAIN LIVING AND PRUDENCE 

He was utterly indifferent as to the appear- 
ance or merits of any tavern or place he stopped 
98 



LIFE ON THE CIRCUIT 99 

at; it was a matter of no consequence to him 
whether a caravansary was good, bad, or indif- 
ferent — the chief sohcitude with him was the 
magnitude of the bill, for from necessity he 
was very prudent in his expenditures, and so 
would stop at the cheaper taverns. He did not, 
however, violate good policy in that regard, and 
whenever it was convenient, roomed with the 
judge while out on the circuit, the general 
knowledge of this fact being helpful in the way 
of securing business from people who argued 
therefrom that advantages accrued to him in 
consequence. 

Judge Davis told Henry C. Whitney that he 
never saw Lincoln angry at poor accommoda- 
tions on the circuit but once. They arrived at 
Charleston on a cold, wet afternoon, chilled 
through and uncomfortable ; the landlord was 
away; there were no fires nor wood. Lincoln 
was thoroughly incensed ; he threw off his coat, 
went to the woodpile, and cut wood with an 
ax for an hour. Davis built a fire, and when 
the landlord made his appearance late, Lincoln 
gave him a good scoring. 

PRIMITIVE COURT-HOUSES 

The court-houses were sometimes framed and 
boarded, but more frequently of logs. The judge 
sat upon a raised platform, behind a rough 
board, sometimes covered with green baize, for 
a table on which to write his notes. A small 
table stood on the floor in front, for the clerk, 
and another larger one in front of the clerk and 
in the area in the centre of the room, around 
which in rude chairs the lawyers were grouped. 



loo ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

too often with their feet on top of it. Rough 
benches were placed there for the jury, parties, 
witnesses, and bystanders. 

The court-house, as Arnold observes, has al- 
ways been very attractive to the people of the 
frontier, supplying the place of theatres, lecture 
and concert rooms, etc., that add to the social 
facilities of older settlements and towns. The 
leading lawyers and judges were the star actors, 
and had each his partisans. Hence crowds at- 
tended the courts to see the judges, to hear the 
lawyers contend with argument, and law, and 
wit for success, victory, and fame. 

From one to another of these rude court- 
houses, the gentlemen of the bar passed, follow- 
ing the judge around his circuit from county to 
county, traveling generally on horseback, with 
saddle-bags, brushes, an extra shirt or two, and 
perhaps two or three law books. Sometimes two 
or three lawyers would unite and travel in a 
buggy, and the poorer and younger ones not 
seldom walked. 

THE TALL PILOT 

This "circuit-riding" involved all sorts of ad- 
ventures. Hard fare at miserable country tav- 
erns, sleeping on the floor, and fording swollen 
streams were every-day occurrences. All such 
experiences were met with good humor and often 
turned into sources of frolic and fun. In ford- 
ing swollen streams, Lincoln was frequently sent 
forward as a "pioneer. His extremely long legs 
enabled him, by taking off his boots and stock- 
ings, and by rolling up or otherwise disposing of 
his trousers, to test the depth of the stream, find 



LIFE ON THE CIRCUIT loi 

the most shallow water, and thus to pilot the 
party through the current without wetting his 
garments. 

SAVING THE BIRDS 

One day Lincoln, Baker, Hardin, Speed, and 
others were riding on horseback along the road, 
two-and-two, some distance from Springfield. 
In passing a thicket of wild-plum and crab-apple 
trees, Lincoln and Hardin being in the rear, the 
former discovered by the roadside two young 
birds not old enough to fly. They had been 
shaken from their nest by a recent gale. 

''The old bird," said Mr. Speed, "was flutter- 
ing about and wailing as a mother ever does for 
her babes. Lincoln stopped, hitched his horse, 
caught the birds, hunted the nest, and placed 
them in it. The rest of us rode on to a creek, 
and while the horses were drinking, Hardin 
rode up. 

" 'Where is Lincoln ?' said one. 

" 'Oh, when I saw him last he had two little 
birds in his hand hunting for their nest.' " 

Li perhaps an hour he came. They laughed 
at him. He said, with much emphasis: 

"Gentlemen, you may laugh, but I could not 
have slept well to-night if I had not saved those 
birds. Their cries would have rung in my 
ears." 

This act was characteristic, and illustrates a 
tenderness of heart that never failed him. 



COMPARATIVE CRIMINALITY 

Lincoln had assisted in the prosecution of a 
man who had robbed his neighbor's hen-roosts. 



102 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

Jogging home along the highway, the foreman 
of the jury, that had convicted the hen-stealer 
comphmented Lincoln on the zeal and ability of 
the prosecution, and then remarked: 

''Why, when the country was young, and I 
was stronger than I am now, I didn't mind pack- 
ing off a sheep now and then — but, stealing 
hens !" — the good man's scorn could not find 
words to express his opinion of a man who 
would steal hens. 



LINCOLN S READY WIT 

Lamon testifies that ''Mr. Lincoln was from 
the beginning of his circuit-riding the light and 
life of the court. The most trivial circumstance 
furnished a background for his wit. The fol- 
lowing incident, which illustrates his love of a 
joke, occurred in the early days of our acquaint- 
ance. I, being at the time on the infant side 
of twenty-one, took particular pleasure in ath- 
letic sports. One day when we were attending 
the circuit court which met at Bloomington, 111., 
I was wrestling near the court-house with some 
one who had challenged me to a trial, and in 
the scuffle made a large rent in the rear of my 
trousers. Before I had time to make any change 
I was called into court to take up a case. The 
evidence was finished. I being the prosecuting 
attorney at the time, got up to address the jury. 
Having on a short coat, my misfortune was 
rather apparent. 

"One of the lawyers, for a joke, started a sub- 
scription paper, which was passed from one 
member of the bar to another as they sat by a 
long table fronting the bench, to buy a pair of 



LIFE ON THE CIRCUIT 103 

pantaloons for Lamon' — he being, the paper said, 
*a poor but worthy young man.' Several put down 
their names with some ridiculous subscription, 
and finally the paper was laid by some one in 
front of Mr. Lincoln, he being engaged in writ- 
ing at the time. He quietly glanced over the 
paper, and, immediately taking up his pen, wrote 
after his name, 

" 'I can contribute nothing to the end in 
view!' " 

THE FAITHFUL FRIEND 

Although the humble condition and disrepu- 
table character of some of his relations and con- 
nections were the subject of constant annoyance 
and most painful reflections, Lincoln never tried 
to shake them off, and never abandoned them 
when they needed his assistance. A son of his 
stepbrother John D. Johnston was arrested for 
stealing a watch. Mr. Lincoln went to address 
a mass-meeting in the town where the boy was 
in jail. He waited until the dusk of the even- 
ing, and then, in company with Mr. H. C. Whit- 
ney, visited the prison. ''Lincoln knew he was 
guilty," says Mr. Whitney, "and was very deeply 
affected — more than I ever saw him. At the 
next term of the court, upon the State's Attor- 
ney's consent, Lincoln and I went to the prose- 
cution witnesses and got them to come into open 
court and state that they did not care to prose- 
cute." The boy was released ; and that evening, 
as the lawyers were leaving the town in their 
buggies, Mr. Lincoln was observed to get down 
from his, and walk back a short distance to a 
poor, distressed-looking young man who stood 
by the roadside. It was young Johnston. Mr. 



104 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

Lincoln engaged for a few moments apparently 
in earnest and nervous conversation with him, 
then giving him some money, and returning to 
his buggy, drove on. 

A TRAVELING STUDENT 

It is well known that Lincoln used to carry 
with him, on what Mr. Stuart calls "the tramp 
around the circuit," ordinary school-books — from 
Euclid down to an English grammar — and study 
them as he rode along, or at intervals of leisure 
in the towns where he stopped. He supple- 
mented these with a copy of Shakespeare, got 
much of it by rote, and recited long passages 
from it to any chance companion by the way. 

THE ABLE AXMAN 

He was intensely fond of cutting wood with 
an ax; and he was often seen to jump from his 
buggy, seize an ax out of the hands of a road- 
side chopper, take his place on the log in the 
most approved fashion, and, with his tremen- 
dous long strokes, cut it in two before the man 
could recover from his surprise. 



CHAPTER IX 
In Congress 

When in 1846 a Congressional election en- 
gaged the attention of political workers in Lin- 
coln's district, he and his friend Judge Logan 
were both candidates for the nomination, but 
the latter withdrew, in consequence, probably, 
of an agreement that he should run next time. 
Logan presented Lincoln's name to the conven- 
tion, which met at Petersburg in May, and he 
was unanimously nominated. 

The Democrats nominated the Reverend Peter 
Cartwright, the most eminent and widely known 
Methodist preacher in the State. Cartwright 
was an untiring worker and personally very pop- 
ular, owing to his force of character. The can- 
vass on both sides was made with great vigor 
and spirit, not to say acrimony. Cartwright, 
says Whitney, appealed to the prejudices of the 
religious community against Lincoln, branding 
him as an infidel, which was a more terrible 
accusation then than now. That the reverend 
gentleman took no pride in this canvass is patent 
in this, that in an autobiography published by 
him afterward the circumstance is not alluded 
to at all. Lincoln was elected by an unprece- 
dented majority — 1,511 votes — the usual major- 
ity in the district being about 500. This was a 
great honor, in view of the kind of canvass 
which was made against him. 
105 



io6 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 



TAKES HIS SEAT 



In December, 1847, Lincoln took his seat in 
Congress — the only Whig member from Illinois. 
His great rival, Douglas, had already run a bril- 
liant career in the House, and now for the first 
time had become a member of the United States 
Senate. These two had met at Vandalia, and 
in the Illinois Legislature had always been rivals, 
and each was now the acknowledged leader of his 
party in Illinois. The Democratic party had, 
since the year 1836, been strongly in the major- 
ity, and Douglas in his State, more than any 
other man, directed and controlled it. Among 
Lincoln's colleagues in Congress from Illinois, 
were John Wentworth, John A. McClernand, and 
William A. Richardson. This Congress had 
among its members many very distinguished 
men. Among them were ex-President John 
Quincy Adams ; Robert C. Winthrop, Speaker ; 
Jacob Collamer, Postmaster-General ; Andrew 
Johnson, elected Vice-President with Lincoln on 
his second election ; Alexander H. Stephens, 
Vice-President of the Confederacy ; besides 
Toombs, Rhett, Cobb, and other prominent lead- 
ers in the rebellion. 

In the Senate were Daniel Webster, John P. 
Hale, John A. Dix, Simon Cameron, Lewis Cass, 
Thomas H. Benton, John C. Calhoun, and Jef- 
ferson Davis. Lincoln entered Congress with 
the reputation of being an able and effective 
popular speaker. 'Tt is curious," says Arnold, 
*'to learn the impression which this prairie or- 
ator, with no college culture, made upon his 
associates." Arnold adds the interesting account 
that substantially follows. 



IN CONGRESS 107 



WINTHROP AND STEPHENS ON LINCOLN 

Robert C. Winthrop, a scholarly and conserva- 
tive man, representing the intelligence of Bos- 
ton, says, when writing thirty-four years there- 
after: "I recall vividly the impressions I then 
formed, both of his ability and amiability. We 
were old Whigs together, and agreed entirely 
upon all questions of public interest. I could 
not always concur in the policy of the party 
which made him President, but I never lost my 
personal regard for him. For shrewdness and 
sagacity, and keen practical sense, he has had 
no superior in our day and generation.". 

Alexander H. Stephens, writing seventeen 
years after Lincoln's death, and recalling their 
service together in Congress, from 1847 to 1849, 
says : 

"I knew Mr. Lincoln well and intimately, and 
we were both ardent supporters of General Tay- 
lor for President in 1848. 

*'Mr. Lincoln was careful as to his manners,, 
awkward in his speech, but was possessed of a 
very strong, clear, vigorous mind. He always at- 
tracted and riveted the attention of the House 
when he spoke. His manner of speech as well 
as thought was original. He had no model. He 
was a man of strong convictions, and what Car- 
lyle would have called an earnest man. He 
abounded in anecdote. He illustrated everything 
he was talking about by an anecdote, always ex- 
ceedingly apt and pointed, and socially he always 
kept his company in a roar of laughter." 



io8 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 



SPEAKING IN CONGRESS 



Lincoln took a more prominent part in the de- 
bates than is usual for new members. On Janu- 
ary 8, 1848, writing to his young partner, Hern- 
don, he says : "By way of experiment, and of 
getting 'the hang of the house,' I made a little 
speech two or three days ago on a post-office 
question of no general interest." (He was sec- 
ond on the Committee of Post-Offices and Post- 
Roads.) "I find speaking here and elsewhere 
almost the same thing. I was about as badly 
scared, and no more than when I speak in court." 
Writing to his partner again soon after, he gave 
the young gentleman some very good advice. 
"The way for a young man to rise," said he, 
"is to improve himself every way he can, never 
suspecting anybody wishes to hinder him. Al- 
low me to assure you that suspicions and jeal- 
ousy never did help any man in any station." 

On January 12, 1848, he made an able and 
elaborate speech on the Mexican War, which 
established his reputation in Congress as an able 
debater. Douglas, long afterward, in their joint 
debate at Ottawa, charged him with taking the 
side of the enemy against his own country in 
this Mexican War. To which Lincoln replied: 
*T was an old Whig, and whenever the Demo- 
cratic party tried to get me to vote that the war 
had been righteously begun by the President, I 
would not do it. But when they asked money, 
or land-warrants, or anything to pay the sol- 
diers, I gave the same vote that Douglas did." 



IN CONGRESS 109 



ABOLITION BILL 



The most Important and significant act of 
Lincoln at this Congress, was the introduction 
by him into the House, of a bill to abolish slav- 
ery in the District of Columbia. The bill pro- 
vided that no person from without the District 
should be held to slavery within it, and that no 
person born thereafter within the District should 
be held to slavery. It provided for the gradual 
emancipation of all the slaves in the District, 
with compensation to their masters, and that the 
act should be submitted to a vote of the people 
of the District. 

Even this bill, mild as it was, would not be 
tolerated by the slave States, and their opposi- 
tion was so decided and unanimous that he was 
not able even to bring it to a vote. He also at 
about that time voted against paying for slaves 
lost by officers in the Seminole War. His term 
as member of Congress expired March 4, 1849, 
and he was not a candidate for reelection. 



AUTOBIOGRAPHY FOR THE CONGRESSIONAL 
DIRECTORY 

Among the papers of the late Charles Lan- 
man there is a sketch of Mr. Lincoln, written 
in his own hand. Mr. Lanman was editor of 
the Congressional Directory at the time that Mr. 
Lincoln was elected to Congress, and, according 
to the ordinary custom, forwarded to him, as 
well as to all other members elect, a blank to be 
filled out with facts and dates which might be 
made the basis for a biographical sketch in the 
Directory. Lincoln's blank was promptly filled 



no ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

up in his own handwriting, with the following 
information : 

"Born February 12, 1809, in Hardin County, 
Kentucky. 

''Education defective. 

''Profession, lawyer. 

"Military service. Captain of Volunteers in 
Black Hawk War. 

"Offices held : Postmaster at a very small of- 
fice ; four times a member of the Illinois Legis- 
lature, and elected to the Lower House of the 
next Congress." 

CHAMPION STORY-TELLER OF THE CAPITOL 

During the Christmas holidays Mr. Lincoln 
found his way into the small room used as the 
post-office of the House, where a few jovial 
raconteurs used to meet almost every morning, 
after the mail had been distributed into the 
members' boxes, to exchange such new stories 
as any of them might have acquired since they 
last met. After modestly standing at the door for 
several days, Mr. Lincoln was "reminded" of a 
story, and by New Year's he was recognized as 
the champion story-teller of the Capitol. 

Mr. Lincoln boarded with Mrs. Spriggs, on 
Capitol Hill, where he had as messmates the 
veteran Joshua R. Giddings of Ohio ; John 
Blanchard, John Dickey, A. R. Mcllvaine, John 
Strohm, and James Pollock, of Pennsylvania ; 
Elisha Embree of Indiana ; and P. W. Tomp- 
kins of Mississippi — all Whigs. 



CHAPTER X 
The Debates with Douglas 

The Illinois Republican State convention that 
met at Springfield on June i6, 1858, nominated 
Lincoln by acclamation "as the first and only 
choice" of the Republican party for United 
States Senator. This time-honored phrase was 
used sincerely on that occasion. There was 
great enthusiasm, absolute unanimity. 

On the evening of the following day he ad- 
dressed the convention in a speech which has 
become historic. His opening words were : 

'Tf we could first know where we are and 
whither we are tending, we could better judge 
what to do and how to do it. We are now far 
into the fifth year since a policy was initiated, 
with the avowed object and confident promise of 
putting an end to the slavery agitation. Under 
the operation of that policy, that agitation has 
not only not ceased, but has constantly aug- 
mented. In my opinion it will not cease until a 
crisis shall have been reached and passed. *A 
house divided against itself cannot stand.' I be- 
lieve this Government cannot endure perma- 
nently half slave and half free. I do not expect 
the Union to be dissolved — I do not expect the 
house to fall — but I do expect it will cease to be 
divided. It will become all one thing or all the 
other. Either the opponents of slavery will 
arrest the further spread of it, and place it 
where the public mind shall rest in the belief 



112 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

that it is in the course of ultimate extinction ; or 
its advocates will push it forward till it shall be- 
come alike lawful in all the States, old as well 
as new, North as well as South." 

This speech came quickly to be known as "the 
house-divided-against-itself speech." By that 
name it is still known. Concluding he said : 
''Our cause, then, must be entrusted to and con- 
ducted by its own undoubted friends, those 
whose hands are free, whose hearts are in the 
work, who do care for the result. . . . The re- 
sult is not doubtful. We shall not fail. If we 
stand firm we shall not fail. Wise counsels may 
accelerate or mistakes delay it, but sooner or 
later the victory is sure to come." 

CHALLENGE TO DOUGLAS 

On July 9 Douglas made an elaborate speech 
in Chicago. Lincoln was in the audience. It 
was unofficially arranged that he should reply. 
He did so the following evening. A week later 
a similar thing occurred in Springfield. Doug- 
las made a speech in the afternoon to which 
Lincoln replied in the evening. Shortly after 
this Lincoln wrote Douglas a letter proposing a 
series of joint discussions, or challenging him 
to a series of joint debates. Douglas replied in 
a patronizing and irritating tone, asked for a 
slight advantage in his own favor, but he ac- 
cepted the proposal. He did not do it in a very 
gracious manner, but he did it. They arranged 
for seven discussions in towns, the locations 
being scattered fairly over the entire territory 
of the State. 



THE DEBATES WITH DOUGLAS 113 



THE TRAVELING RIVALS 

At the outset Douglas had the advantage of 
prestige. Nothing succeeds hke success. Doug- 
las had all his life had little but success. He 
twice had missed the nomination for the Presi- 
dency, but he was still the most formidable man 
in the Senate. He was very popular in his own 
State. He was everywhere greeted by large 
crowds, with bands of music and other demon- 
strations. He always traveled in a special car, 
and often in a special train, which was freely 
placed at his disposal by the Illinois Central Rail- 
road. Lincoln traveled by accommodation train, 
freight-train, or wagon, as best he could. As 
both the men were every day speaking independ- 
ently between the debates, the question of trans- 
portation v/as serious. The inconveniences of 
travel made a great drain upon nervous force 
and health. One day when the freight-train 
bearing Lincoln was side-tracked to let his 
rival's special train roll by, he good-humoredly 
remarked that Douglas "did not smell any roy- 
alty in this car." 

METHODS COMPARED 

The methods of the two men were as diverse 
as their bodily appearance. Douglas was mas- 
ter of the art of ''making the worse appear the 
better reason." He was able to misstate his 
antagonist's position so shrewdly as to deceive 
the very elect. And with equal skill he could 
escape from the real meaning of his own state- 
ments. Lincoln's characterization is apt: ''Judge 
Douglas is playing cuttlefish^ — a small species of 



114 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

iish that has no mode of defending itself when 
pursued except by throwing out a black fluid 
which makes the water so dark the enemy can- 
not see it, and thus it escapes." 

Lincoln's method was to hold the discussion 
down to the point at issue with clear and for- 
cible statement. He arraigned the iniquity of 
slavery as an offence against God. He made 
the phrase *'all men" of the Declaration of Inde- 
pendence include the black as well as the white. 
Said he : "There is no reason in the world why 
the negro is not entitled to all the natural rights 
enumerated in the Declaration of Independence 
— the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of 
happiness. ... In the right to eat the bread, 
without the leave of anybody else, which his own 
hand earns, he is my equal, and the equal of 
Judge Douglas, and the equal of every living 
man." 

These debates occupied seven different even- 
ings of three hours each. The speeches were 
afterward published in book form and had a 
wide circulation. The speeches, numbering 
twenty-one in all, filled a large volume. It is 
not the purpose of this chapter to give an out- 
line of the debates, for they will be found in 
full in another volume of the present edition. 
Here it is only intended to give a general idea 
of their result. Out of them came one promi- 
nent effect, which so influenced the careers of 
the two men that it must be briefly recorded. 
This went by the name of the *'Freeport doc- 
trine." 



THE DEBATES WITH DOUGLAS 115 



CROSS-QUESTIONING 

In the first debate Douglas had asked Lincohi 
a series of questions. The trickery of these 
questions was in the innuendo. They began^ 
'T desire to know whether Lincoln stands to- 
day, as he did in 1854, in favor of," etc. Doug- 
las then quoted from the platform of a conven- 
tion which Lincoln had not attended, and with 
which he had nothing to do. Lincoln denied 
these insinuations, and said that he had never 
favored those doctrines ; but the trick succeeded, 
and the impression was made that Douglas had 
cornered him. The questions, to all intents and 
purposes, were a forgery. This forgery was 
quickly exposed by a Chicago paper, and the 
result was not helpful to Douglas, It was made 
manifest that he was not conducting the debates 
in a fair and manly way. 

Further than this, the fact that these questions 
had been asked gave Lincoln, in turn, the right 
to ask questions of Douglas. This right he used. 
For the next debate, which was to be at Free- 
port, he prepared, among others, the following 
question : ''Can the people of a United States 
Territory, in any lawful way, against the wish 
of any citizen of the United States, exclude 
slavery from its limits prior to the formation of 
a State constitution?" If this were answered 
"No," it would alienate the citizens of Illinois. 
If it were answered "Yes," it would alienate the 
Democrats of the South. 

On the way to Freeport he met a number of 
friends and took counsel of them. When he 
read question number two, the one above quoted, 
his friends earnestly and unanimously advised 



ii6 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

him not to put that question. "If you do/' said 
they, "you never can be Senator." To which 
Lincoln repHed : "Gentlemen, I am killing larger 
game. If Douglas answers, he can never be 
President, and the battle of i860 is worth a 
hundred of this." 



AFTER THE BATTLE 

It is not probable that Lincoln expected to be 
in i860 the nominee of the Republican party, 
hut he did see the danger of the election of 
Douglas to the Presidency. He was willing to 
surrender the senatorial election to save the 
country from a Douglas administration. The 
sacrifice was made. The prediction proved true. 
Lincoln lost the senatorship, Douglas lost the 
Presidency. 

The popular verdict, as shown in the election, 
was in favor of Lincoln. The Republicans polled 
125,430 votes; the Douglas Democrats, 121,609, 
and the Buchanan Democrats, 5,071. But the 
apportionment of the legislative districts was 
such that Douglas had a majority on the joint 
ballot of the Legislature. He received 54 votes 
to 46 for Lincoln. This secured his reelection 
to the Senate. 

The popular verdict outside the State of Illi- 
nois was in favor of Lincoln. The Republican 
party circulated the volume containing the full 
report of the speeches. It does not appear that 
the Democrats did so. This forces the conclu- 
sion that the intellectual and moral victory was 
on the side of Lincoln. 



THE DEBATES WITH DOUGLAS 117 



LINCOLN AND DOUGLAS CONTRASTED 

The opposite qualities of the debaters are well 
shown in the following statements by a shrewd 
observer, David R. Locke, once known all over 
the country for his clever writings under the 
pseudonym of "Petroleum V. Nasby " : 

The difference between the two men was illus- 
trated that day in their opening remarks. Lin- 
coln said (I quote from memory) : 

"I have had no immediate conference with 
Judge Douglas, but I am sure that he and I 
will agree that your entire silence when I speak 
and he speaks will be most agreeable to us." 

Douglas said at the beginning of his speech : 
*'The highest compliment you can pay me is by 
observing a strict silence. / desire rather to he 
heard than applauded." 

The inborn modesty of the one and the bound- 
less vanity of the other could not be better illus- 
trated. Lincoln claimed nothing for himself — 
Douglas spoke as if applause must follow his 
utterances. 

The character of the two men was still better 
illustrated in their speeches. The self-sufficiency 
of Douglas in his opening might be pardoned, for 
he had been fed on applause ; . . . but his being 
a popular idol could not justify the demagogy 
that saturated the speech itself. Douglas was 
the demagogue all the way through. There was 
no trick of presentation that he did not use. 
He suppressed facts, twisted conclusions, and 
perverted history. He wriggled and turned and 
dodged; he appealed to prejudices; in short, it 
was evident that what he was laboring for was 
Douglas and nothing else. . . . 



ii8 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

Lincoln, on the other hand, kept strictly to the 
questions at issue, and no one could doubt but 
that the cause for which he was speaking was 
the only thing he had at heart ; that his personal 
interests did not weigh a particle. . . . He knew 
that the people had intelligence enough to strike 
the average correctly. His great strength was 
in trusting the people instead of considering 
them as babes in arms. He did not profess to 
know everything. 

The audience admired Douglas, but they re- 
spected his simple-minded opponent. 

STONING STEPHEN 

In one of the debates, it is said, Douglas 
led off with so captivating a discourse that his 
opponent's adherents believed the battle was 
fairly won. But Lincoln got up as soon as the 
cheers died away, looking taller and more angu- 
lar than ever. Taking off his long linen duster, 
he dropped it on the arm of a young bystander, 
remarking in his far-pervading voice : 
**Hold my coat while I stone Stephen!" 
This went far toward annulling the good ef- 
fect of Stephen A. Douglas's harangue and Lin- 
coln was heard with keen attention. 



THE SIXTH JOINT DEBATE, AT OUINCY 

Our account of this debate is taken from The 
Reminiscences of Carl ScJiurz, a fascinating 
work by a public man who knew Lincoln's char- 
acter well, and who has written elsewhere of 
the great President with high appreciation and 
brilliant analysis. 



THE DEBATES WITH DOUGLAS 119 

The great debate took place in the afternoon 
on the open square, where a large pine-board 
platform had been built for the committee of 
arrangements, the speakers, and the persons they 
wished to have with them. I thus was favored 
with a seat on that platform. In front of it 
many thousands of people were assembled, Re- 
publicans and Democrats standing peaceably 
together, only chaffing one another now and then 
in a good-tempered way. 

As the champions arrived they were demon- 
stratively cheered by their adherents. The pre- 
siding officer agreed upon by the two parties 
called the meeting to order and announced the 
program of proceedings. Mr. Lincoln was to 
open with an allowance of an hour, and Senator 
Douglas was to follow with a speech of one 
hour and a half, and Mr. Lincoln was to speak 
half an hour in conclusion. The first part of 
Mr. Lincoln's opening address was devoted to a 
refutation of some things Douglas had said at 
previous meetings. This refutation may, indeed, 
have been required for the settlement of disputed 
points, but it did not strike me as anything ex- 
traordinary, either in substance or in form. . . . 

There was, however, in all he said, a tone of 
earnest truthfulness, of elevated, noble senti- 
ment, and of kindly sympathy, which added 
greatly to the strength of his argument, and 
became, as in the course of his speech he 
touched upon the moral side of the question in 
debate, powerfully impressive. . . . 

When Lincoln had sat down amid the enthu- 
siastic plaudits of his adherents, I asked myself 
with some trepidation in my heart, ''What will 
Douglas say now?" . . . 



I20 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

No more striking contrast could have been 
imagined than that between those two men as 
they appeared upon the platform. By the side 
of Lincoln's tall, lank, and ungainly form, Doug- 
las stood almost like a dwarf, very short of stat- 
ure, but square-shouldered and broad-chested, 
a massive head upon a strong neck, the very 
embodiment of force, combativeness, and staying 
power. . . . While he was listening to Lincoln's 
speech, a contemptuous smile now and then flitted 
across his lips, and when he rose, the tough 
parliamentary gladiator, he tossed his mane with 
an air of overbearing superiority, of threatening 
defiance, as if to say, "How dare any one stand 
up against me?" . . . 

No language seemed too offensive for him, 
and even inoffensive things he would sometimes 
bring out in a manner which sounded as if in- 
tended to be insulting; and thus he occasionally 
called forth, instead of applause from his 
friends, demonstrations of remonstrance from 
the opposition. But his sentences were well put 
together, his points strongly accentuated, his 
argumentation seemingly clear and plausible, his 
sophisms skilfully woven so as to throw the de- 
sired flood of darkness upon the subject and 
thus beguile the untutored mind, his appeals to 
prejudice unprincipled and reckless, but shrewdly 
aimed, and his invectives vigorous and exceed- 
ingly trying to the temper of the assailed party. 
On the whole, his friends were well pleased with 
his performance, and rewarded him with vocif- 
erous cheers. 

But then came Lincoln's closing speech of half 
an hour, which seemed completely to change the 
temper of the atmosphere. He replied to Doug- 



THE DEBATES WITH DOUGLAS 121 

las's arguments and attacks with rapid thrusts 
so deft and piercing, with humorous retort so 
quaint and pat, with witty ilhistrations so cHnch- 
ing, and he did it all so good-naturedly, that the 
meeting, again and again, broke out into bursts 
of delight by which even many of his opponents 
were carried away, while the scowl on Douglas's 
face grew darker and darker. 

LINCOLN THE ORATOR 

If the question still be asked, Was Lincoln an 
orator ? the answer must be : Yes, at times as 
great as the greatest of orators. He was always 
simple, earnest, and entirely sincere. At times 
he rose to the very highest eloquence — on rare 
occasions when greatly moved. When carried 
away by some great theme, with some vast audi- 
ence before him, he seemed at times like one 
inspired. He would begin in a diflident and 
awkward manner, but, as he became absorbed 
in his subject, then would come that wonder- 
ful transformation, of which many have spoken. 
Self-consciousness, diffidence, and awkwardness 
disappeared. His attitude became dignified, his 
figure seemed to expand, his features were illu- 
minated, his eyes blazed with excitement, and 
his action became bold and commanding. Then 
his voice and everything about him became elec- 
tric, his cadence changed with every feeling, 
and his whole aiidience became completely mag- 
netized. Every sentence called forth a respon- 
sive emotion. To see Lincoln, on such great 
occasions, on an open prairie, the central figure 
of ten thousand people, every sound but that of 
his voice hushed to perfect silence, every eye 



122 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

bent upon him, every ear open, eager to catch 
each word, his voice clear and powerful, and of 
a key that could be distinctly heard by all the 
vast multitude, was to see a prophet with a mes- 
sage inspired. To hear him on such occasions, 
speaking on the great themes of freedom and 
slavery, was to think of Demosthenes thunder- 
ing against Philip ; better than that, it was like 
hearing Patrick Henry plead for American 
liberty. 



I 



CHAPTER XI 
"Widening Renown 

In September, 1859, Lincoln made a few mas- 
terly speeches in Ohio, where Douglas had pre- 
ceded him on his new hobby of "squatter sover- 
eignty," or "unfriendly legislation." Lincoln 
spoke at Columbus, Cincinnati, and several other 
places, each time devoting the greater part of 
his address to Douglas and his theories, as if the 
habit of combating that illustrious chieftain were 
hard to break. 

In December he went to Kansas, speaking at 
Elwood, Donaphan, Troy, Atchison, and twice 
at Leavenworth. Wherever he went he was met 
by vast assemblages of people. His speeches 
were principally repetitions of those previously 
made in Illinois ; but they were very fresh and 
captivating to his new audiences. These jour- 
neys, which turned out to be continuous ova- 
tions, spread his name and fame far beyond the 
limits to which they had heretofore been re- 
stricted. 

NEW YORK INVITATION 

It was in October, 1859, that Lincoln received 
an invitation to speak in New York. It de- 
lighted him. No event of his life had given him 
more heartfelt pleasure. He went straight to 
his office, and Herndon says he "looked pleased, 
not to say tickled. He said to me, 'Billy, I am 
invited to deliver a lecture in New York. Shall 
123 



124 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

I go?' ^By all means,' I replied; 'and it is a 
good opening too.' 'If you were in my fix, what 
subject would you choose?' said Lincoln. 'Why, 
a political one: that's your forte,' I answered." 
Lincoln wrote, in response to the invitation, 
that he would avail himself of it the coming 
February, provided he might be permitted to 
make a political speech, in case he found it in- 
convenient to get up one of another kind. He 
had purposely set the day far ahead, that he 
might thoroughly prepare himself ; and it may 
safely be said that no effort of his life cost him 
so much labor as this. Some of the party man- 
agers who were afterward put to work to verify 
its statements, and get it out as a campaign docu- 
ment, are said to have been three weeks in find- 
ing the historical records consulted by him. 

THE COOPER UNION (INSTITUTE) SPEECH 

On February 25, i860, he arrived in New 
York. It was Saturday, and he spent the whole 
day in revising and retouching his speech. The 
next day he heard Beecher preach, and on Mon- 
day wandered about the city to see the sights. 
When the committee under whose auspices he 
was to speak waited upon him, they found him 
dressed in a sleek and shining suit of new black, 
covered with very apparent creases and wrinkles, 
acquired by being packed too closely and too 
long in his little valise. He felt uneasy in his 
new clothes and in a strange place. His con- 
fusion was increased when the reporters called 
to get the printed slips of his speech in advance 
of its delivery. Mr. Lincoln knew nothing of 
such a custom among the orators, and had no 



WIDENING RENOWN 125 

slips. He was, in fact, not quite sure that the 
press would desire to publish his speech. When 
he reached the Cooper Institute, and was ushered 
into the vast hall, he was surprised to see the 
most cultivated men of the city awaiting him on 
the stand, and an immense audience assembled 
to hear him. Mr. Bryant introduced him as "an 
eminent citizen of the West, hitherto known to 
you only by reputation." 

The speech then delivered (reprinted in an- 
other volume of this series) was strictly intel- 
lectual from beginning to end. Though Lincoln 
was not known in New York, Douglas was. So 
he fittingly took his start with a quotation from 
Douglas — words uttered at Columbus a few 
months before : "Our fathers, when they framed 
the Government under which we live, under- 
stood this question [the question of slavery] just 
as well, and even better, than we do now." To 
this proposition Lincoln assented. That raised 
the inquiry. What was their understanding of 
the question? This was a historical question, 
and could be answered only by honest and pains- 
taking research. 



HOW IT WAS RECEIVED 

Not only was this speech received with un- 
bounded enthusiasm by the mass of the people, 
but it was a revelation to the more intellectual 
and cultivated. Lincoln afterward told of a pro- 
fessor of rhetoric at Yale College who was pres- 
ent. He made an abstract of the speech and the 
next day presented it to the class as a model of 
cogency and finish. This professor followed 
Lincoln to Meriden to hear him again. 



126 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

The morning after its delivery the New York 
Tribune presented a report of the speech, and 
in doing so, said, "the tones, the gestures, the 
kindhng eye, and the mirth-provoking look defy 
the reporter's skill. . . . No man ever before 
made such an impression on his first appeal to 
a New York audience." The Evening Post said, 
■"'We have made room for Mr. Lincoln's speech, 
notwithstanding the pressure of other matters; 
and our readers will see that it was well worthy 
of the deep attention with which it was heard." 
For the publication of such arguments the editor 
was ''tempted to wish" that his columns "were 
indefinitely elastic." These are fair examples of 
the general tone of the press. 

NEW ENGLAND TOUR 

From New York Mr. Lincoln traveled into 
New England, to visit his son Robert, who was 
a student at Harvard ; but he was overwhelmed 
with invitations to address Republican meetings. 
In Connecticut he spoke at Hartford, Norwich, 
New Haven, Meriden, and Bridgeport ; in Rhode 
Island, at Woonsocket; in New Hampshire, at 
Concord and Manchester. Everywhere the peo- 
ple poured out in multitudes, and the press lav- 
ished encomiums. Upon his speech at Manchester, 
the Mirror, a neutral paper, passed the follow- 
ing criticisms of his style of oratory — criticisms 
familiar enough to the people of his own State : 
*'He spoke an hour and a half with great fair- 
ness, great apparent candor, and with wonderful 
interest. He did not abuse the South, the ad- 
ministration, or the Democrats, or indulge in 
any personalities, with the exception of a few 



WIDENING RENOWN 127 

hits at Douglas's notions. He is far from pre- 
possessing in personal appearance, and his voice 
is disagreeable ; and yet he wins your attention 
and good will from the start. At the close of 
this Eastern tour Lincoln had become prominent 
as a ''Presidential possibility." 

"the greatest man since ST. Paul" 

This is the testimony of one who was present 
on that historic occasion, as given by Noah 
Brooks in his Abraham Lincoln and the Down- 
fall of Slavery. 

"When Lincoln rose to speak, I was greatly 
disappointed. He was tall, tall — oh, how tall! 
— and so angular and awkward that I had, for 
an instant, a feeling of pity for so ungainly a 
man. His clothes were black and ill-fitting, 
badly wrinkled — as if they had been jammed 
carelessly into a small trunk. His bushy head, 
with stiff black hair thrown back, was balanced 
on a long and lean head-stalk, and when he 
raised his hands in an opening gesture, I no- 
ticed that they were very large. He began in 
a low tone of voice — as if he were used to speak- 
ing outdoors, and was afraid of speaking too 
loud. He said, 'Mr. Cheerman' instead of 'Mr. 
Chairman,' and employed many other words 
with an old-fashioned pronunciation. I said to 
myself: 

" 'Old fellow, you won't do ; it's all very well 
for the wild West, but this will never go down 
in New York.' 

"But pretty soon he began to get into his sub- 
ject; he straightened up, made regular and 
graceful gestures; his face lighted as with an 



128 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

inward fire ; the whole man was transfigured. 
I forgot his clothes, his personal appearance, his 
individual peculiarities. Presently, forgetting 
myself, I was on my feet with the rest, yelling 
like a wild Indian, cheering this wonderful man. 
In the close parts of his argument, you could 
hear the gentle sizzling of the gas-burners. 
When he reached a climax the thunders of ap- 
plause were terrific. It was a great speech. 

"When I came out of the hall, my face glow- 
ing with excitement and my frame all a-quiver, 
a friend, with his eyes aglow, asked me what I 
thought of Abe Lincoln the rail-splitter. I said : 

" 'He's the greatest man since St. Paul.' And 
I think so yet." 

LINCOLN AND THE BIRTH OF THE REPUBLICAN 
PARTY 

The growing influence and widening recogni- 
tion of Lincoln had not, as we know, been due 
to any sudden or fortuitous turn in his career 
to this time. In order to get a better view of his 
advance toward the larger political field in which 
he was to become the commanding figure, it may 
be well here to go back a few years and trace 
his connection with the beginnings of the great 
party that he led to its first national victory. 

The year 1856 saw the dissolution of the old 
Whig party. It had become too narrow and 
restricted to answer the needs of the hour. A 
new platform was demanded, that would admit 
the great principles and issues growing out of 
the slavery agitation. A convention of the Whig 
leaders throughout the country met at Pittsburg, 
Pa., on February 22, 1856, to consider the neces- 



WIDENING RENOWN 129 

sity of a new organization. A little later, Mr. 
Herndon, in the office of Mr. Lincoln, called a 
convention at Bloomington, 111., "summoning to- 
gether all those who wished to see the Govern- 
ment conducted on the principles of Washing- 
ton and Jefferson." 

The call was signed by the most prominent 
abolitionists of Illinois, with the name of A. 
Lincoln at the head. The morning after its pub- 
lication, ]\Iajor Stuart entered Mr. Herndon's 
office in a state of extreme excitement, and, as 
the latter relates, demanded: '' 'Sir, did Mr. Lin- 
coln sign that abolition call which is published 
this morning?' I answered, 'Mr. Lincoln did not 
sign that call.' 'Did Lincoln authorize you to 
sign it?' 'No, he never authorized me to sign 
it.' 'Then do you know that you have ruined 
Mr. Lincoln?' 'I did not know that I had ruined 
Mr. Lincoln ; did not intend to do so ; thought he 
was a made man by it ; that the time had come 
when conservatism was a crime and a blunder.' 
'You, then, take the responsibility of your acts, 
do you?' 'I do, most emphatically.' However, 
I instantly sat down and wrote to Mr. Lincoln, 
who was then in Pekin or Tremont — possibly at 
court. He received my letter, and instantly re- 
plied, either by letter or telegraph — most likely 
by letter — that he adopted, in toto, what I had 
done, and promised to meet the radicals — Love- 
joy and such like men' — among us." Mr. Hern- 
don adds: "Never did a man change as Lincoln 
did from that hour. No sooner had he planted 
himself right on the slavery question than his 
whole soul seemed burning. He blossomed right 
out. Then, too, other spiritual things grew more 
real to him." 



130 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 



ANTI-SLAVERY LITERATURE 

Mr. Herndon had been an abolitionist from 
birth. It was an inheritance with him ; but Lin- 
cohi's conversion was a gradual process, stimu- 
lated and confirmed by the influence of his 
companion. **From 1854 to i860," says Mr. 
Herndon, "I kept putting into Lincoln's hands the 
speeches and sermons of Theodore Parker, Wen- 
dell Phillips, and Henry Ward Beecher. I took 
the Anti-slavery Standard for years before 1856, 
the Chicago Trihiinc, and the New York Tri- 
bune', kept them in my office; kept them pur- 
posely on my table, and would read to Lincoln 
the good, sharp, and solid things well put. Lin- 
coln was a natural anti-slavery man, as I think, 
and yet he needed watching — needed hope, faith, 
energy; and I think I warmed him.'' 

herndon's ''bone philosophy" 

It is stated that ''when Herndon was very 
young — probably before Mr. Lincoln made his 
first protest in the Legislature of the State in 
behalf of liberty — Lincoln once said to him: 'I 
cannot see what makes your convictions so de- 
cided as regards the future of slavery. What 
tells you the thing must be rooted out?' 'I feel 
it in my bones,' was Herndon's emphatic answer. 
'This continent is not broad enough to endure 
the contest between freedom and slavery!' It 
was almost in these very words that Mr. Lincoln 
afterward opened the great contest between 
Douglas and himself. From this time forward 
he submitted all public questions to what he 
called 'the test of Bill Herndon's bone philoso- 



WIDENING RENOWN 131 

phy' ; and their arguments were close and pro- 
tracted." 

Long before Mr. Herndon published the call 
for the Bloomington convention, he had said to a 
deputation of men from Chicago, in answer to 
the inquiry whether Mr. Lincoln could be trusted 
for freedom: "Can you trust yourselves? If you 
can, you can trust Lincoln forever." 

THE BLOOMINGTON CONVENTION LINCOLN'S 

GREAT SPEECH 

The convention met at Bloomington, May 29, 
1856; "and it was there," says Mr. Herndon, in 
one of his lectures, "that Lincoln was baptized, 
and joined our church. He made a speech to 
us. I have heard or read all of Mr. Lincoln's 
great speeches ; and I give it as my opinion that 
the Bloomington speech was the grand effort of 
his life. Heretofore, and up to this moment, he 
had simply argued the slavery question on 
grounds of policy — on what are called the states- 
man s grounds — never reaching the question of 
the radical and eternal right. Now he was newly 
baptized and freshly born ; he had the fervor of 
a new convert; the smothered flame broke out; 
enthusiasm unusual to him blazed up ; his eyes 
w^ere aglow with inspiration; he felt justice; his 
heart was alive to the right ; his sympathies burst 
forth ; and he stood before the throne of the eter- 
nal Right, in presence of his God, and then and 
there unburdened his penitential and fired soul. 

"This speech was fresh, new, genuine, odd, 
original ; filled with fervor not unmixed with 
a divine enthusiasm ; his head breathing out 
through his tender heart its truths, its sense o^ 



132 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

right, and its feeling of the good and for the 
good. This speech was full of fire and energy 
and force ; it was logic ; it was pathos ; it was 
enthusiasm; it was justice, equity, truth, right, 
and good, set ablaze by the divine fires of a soul 
maddened by wrong ; it was hard, heavy, knotty, 
gnarly, edged, and heated. I attempted for 
about fifteen minutes, as was usual with me, to 
take notes ; but at the end of that time I threw 
pen and paper to the dogs, and lived only in the 
inspiration of the hour. If Mr. Lincoln was six 
feet four inches high usually, at Bloomingtoii 
he was seven feet, and inspired at that. From 
that day to the day of his death, he stood firm on 
the right. He felt his great cross, had his great 
idea, nursed it, kept it, taught it to others, and 
in his fidelity bore witness of it to his death, and 
finally sealed it with his precious blood." 

FOLLOWING Lincoln's lead 

The committee on resolutions, at the conven- 
tion, found themselves, after hours of discussion, 
unable to agree ; and at last they sent for Lin- 
coln. He suggested that all could unite on the 
principles of the Declaration of Independence 
and hostility to the extension of slavery. ''Let 
us," said he, ''in building our new party, make 
our corner-stone the Declaration of Indepen- 
dence ; let us build on this rock, and the gates 
of hell shall not prevail against us." The prob- 
lem was mastered, and the convention adopted 
the following: 

''Resolved, That we hold, in accordance with 
the opinions and practices of all the great states- 
men of all parties for the first sixty years of 



WIDENING RENOWN 133 

the administration of the Government, that, un- 
der the Constitution, Congress possesses full 
power to prohibit slavery in the Territories ; and 
that while we will maintain all constitutional 
rights of the South, we also hold that justice, 
humanity, the principles of freedom, as ex- 
pressed in our Declaration of Independence and 
our national Constitution, and the purity and per- 
petuity of our Government, require that that 
power should be exerted to prevent the extension 
of slavery into Territories heretofore free." 

The Bloomington convention concluded its work 
by choosing delegates to the Republican national 
convention to be held at Philadelphia the follow- 
ing month, for the nomination of candidates for 
the Presidency and Vice-Presidency of the 
United States. And thus was organized the 
Republican party in Illinois, which revolution- 
ized the State and elected Lincoln to the Presi- 
dency. Lincoln's speech to this convention has 
rarely been equaled. ''Never," says one of the 
delegates, "was an audience more completely 
electrified by human eloquence. Again and 
again, during the delivery, the audience sprang 
to their feet, and by long-continued cheers, ex- 
pressed how deeply the speaker had aroused 
them." 

FIRST REPUBLICAN NATIONAL CONVENTION : FRE- 
MONT AND DAYTON 

The first national convention of the Republi- 
can party met at Philadelphia, in June, 1856, and 
adopted a declaration of principles substantially 
based upon those of the Bloomington convention. 
John C. Fremont was nominated as candidate 



134 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

for President. Among the names presented for 
Vice-President was that of Abraham Lincoln. 
He received, however, but no votes, against 259 
for Mr. Dayton, and 180 scattered; and Mr. 
Dayton was unanimously declared the nominee. 
When the news reached Mr. Lincoln, in Illi- 
nois, that he had received no votes, some of the 
lawyers in the court-house insisted that it must 
have been tJieir Lincoln; but he said, "No, it 
could not be; it must have been the great [Levi] 
Lincoln of Massachusetts !" He was then in one 
of his melancholy moods, full of depression and 
despondency. 

LINCOLN ON THE POLITICAL FUTURE 

Noah Brooks made Mr. Lincoln's acquaint- 
ance at a Republican mass-meeting during the 
campaign of 1856. After Lincoln had spoken, 
and while some of the other orators were enter- 
taining the audience, the two drew a little off 
from the crowd and fell into a discussion over 
the political situation and prospects. "We 
crawled under the pendulous branches of a tree," 
says Mr. Brooks, "and Lincoln, lying flat on the 
ground, with his chin in his hands, talked on, 
rather gloomily as to the present, but absolutely 
confident as to the future. I was dismayed to 
find that he did not believe it possible that Fre- 
mont could be elected. As if half pitying my 
youthful ignorance, but admiring my enthusiasm, 
he said, 'Don't be discouraged if we don't carry 
the day this year. We can't do it, that's certain. 
We can't carry Pennsylvania ; those old Whigs 
down there are too strong for us. But we shall, 
sooner or later, elect our President. I feel con- 



WIDENING RENOWN 135 

fident of that.' 'Do you think we shall elect a 
Free-soil President in i860?' I asked. 'Well, I 
don't know. Everything depends on the course 
of the Democracy. There's a big anti-slavery 
element in the Democratic party, and if we could 
get hold of that we might possibly elect our man 
in i860. But it's doubtful, very doubtful. Per- 
haps we shall be able to fetch it by 1864; perhaps 
not. As I said before, the Free-soil party is 
bound to win in the long run. It may not be in 
my day; but it will be in yours, I do really be- 
lieve.' " The defeat of Fremont soon verified 
Lincoln's prediction on that score. And the pos- 
sibility of i860 — could he have had some pre- 
vision of its fulfilment, notwithstanding his ex- 
pressed doubt? 



CHAPTER XII 
Love Affairs and Marriage 

We have already spoken of James Rutledge 
as the founder of New Salem. At one time, 
along with his other business — which appears 
to have been quite extensive and various — Mr. 
Rutledge kept the tavern, the small house with 
four rooms on the main street of New Salem, 
just opposite Lincoln's grocery. There Mr. 
Lincoln came to board late in 1832, or early in 
1833. The family consisted of the father, 
mother, and nine children — three of them born 
in Kentucky and six in Illinois ; three grown up, 
and the rest quite young. Ann, the third child, 
was born January 7, 181 3, and was about nine- 
teen years of age when Mr. Lincoln came to 
live in the house. 

When Ann was just turned of seventeen, and 
still attending the school of that redoubtable 
pedagogue Minter Graham, there came to New 
Salem a young gentleman of singular enterprise, 
tact, and capacity for business. He engaged 
board with Mr. Rutledge's friend and partner, 
James Cameron, and gave out his name as John 
McNeil. He came to New Salem with no other 
capital than good sense and an active and plucky 
spirit ; but somehow fortune smiled indiscrimi- 
nately on all his endeavors, and very soon — as 
early as the latter part of 1832 — he found him- 
self a well-to-do and prosperous man, owning 
136 



LOVE AFFAIRS AND MARRIAGE 137 

a snug farm seven miles north of New Salem, 
and a half -interest in the largest store of the 
place. 

JOHN MCNAMAR 

In the mean time McNeil and his partner, 
Hill, had both fallen in love with Ann Riitledge, 
and both courted her with devoted assiduity. 
But the contest had long since been decided in 
favor of McNeil, and Ann loved him with all 
her susceptible and sensitive heart. When the 
time drew near for McNeil to depart, he con- 
fided to Ann a strange story — and, in the eyes 
of a person less fond, a very startling story. His 
name was not John McNeil at all, but John 
McNamar. His family was a highly respectable 
one in the State of New York; but a few years 
before his father had failed in business, and 
there was great distress at home. He (John) 
then conceived the romantic plan of running 
away, and, at some undefined place in the far 
West, making a sudden fortune with which to 
retrieve the family disaster. He fled accord- 
ingly, changed his name to avoid the pursuit of 
his father, found his way to New Salem, and — 
she knew the rest. He was now able to perform 
that great act of filial piety which he set out to 
accomplish, would return at once to the relief 
of his parents, and, in all human probability, 
bring them back with him to his new home in 
Illinois. At all events, she might look for his 
return as speedily as the journey could be made 
with ordinary diligence ; and thenceforward 
there should be no more partings between him 
and his fair Ann. She believed this tale, because 
she loved the man that told it ; and she would 



138 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

have believed it all the same if it had been ten 
times as incredible. 

McNamar wrote to Ann that there was sick- 
ness in the family, and he could not return at 
the time appointed. Then there were other and 
still other postponements ; "circumstances over 
which he had no control" prevented his depar- 
ture from time to time, until years had rolled 
away, and Ann's heart had grown sick with hope 
deferred. She never quite gave him up, but 
continued to expect him until death terminated 
her melancholy watch. His inexplicable delay, 
however, the in frequency of his letters, and their 
unsatisfactory character' — these and something 
else had broken her attachment, and toward the 
last she waited for him only to ask a release 
from the engagement, and to say that she pre- 
ferred another and a more urgent suitor. 

LINCOLN AND ANN RUTLEDGE 

When Mr. Lincoln first saw Ann she was 
probably the most refined woman with whom 
he had then ever spoken- — a modest, delicate 
creature, fascinating by reason of the mere con- 
trast with the rude people by whom they were 
both surrounded. She had a secret, too, and a 
sorrow — the unexplained and painful absence of 
McNamar — which no doubt made her all the 
more interesting to him whose spirit was often 
even more melancholy than her own. It would 
be difficult to trace the growth of an attach- 
ment at a time and place so distant ; but it actu- 
ally grew, and became an intense and mutual 
passion. 

It is probable that the family looked upon 



LOVE AFFAIRS AND MARRIAGE 139 

McNamar's delay with more suspicion than Ann 
did herself. At all events, all her adult relatives 
encouraged the suit which Lincoln early began 
to press ; and as time, absence, and apparent 
neglect gradually told against McNamar, she 
listened to him with growing interest, until, in 
1835, we find them formally and solemnly be- 
trothed. 

Ann now waited only for the return of Mc- 
Namar to marry Lincoln. She was urged to 
marry immediately, without regard to anything 
but her own happiness ; but she said she could 
not consent to it until McNamar came back and 
released her from her pledge. At length, how- 
ever, as McNamar's reappearance became more 
and more hopeless, she took a different view of 
it, and then thought she would become Abe's 
wife as soon as he found the means of a decent 
livelihood. 



ANNS death: LINCOLN S GRIEF 

In the summer of 1835 Ann showed unmis- 
takable symptoms of failing health, attributable, 
as most of the neighborhood believed, to the dis- 
tressing attitude she felt bound to maintain be- 
tween her two lovers. On August 25 in that 
year she died of what the doctors chose to call 
brain-fever. 

A few days before her death Lincoln was 
summoned to her bedside. What happened in 
that solemn conference was known only to him 
and the dying girl. But when he left her, and 
stopped at the house of John Jones, on his way 
home, Jones saw signs of the most terrible dis- 
tress in his face and his conduct. When Ann 



I40 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

actually died, and was buried, his grief became 
frantic: he lost all self-control, even the con- 
sciousness of identity, and every friend he had 
in New Salem declared that Lincoln was crazy. 
"'He was watched with especial vigilance," as 
William Greene tells us, "during storms, fogs, 
damp, gloomy v/eather, for fear of an accident." 
At such times he raved piteously, declaring, 
among other wild expressions of his woe, "I can 
never be reconciled to have the snow, rains, and 
storms to beat upon her grave!" 

'The death of Ann Rutledge," says Ida M. 
Tarbell, "plunged Lincoln into the deepest 
gloom. He was seen walking alone by the river 
and through the woods, muttering strange things 
to himself. He seemed to his friends to be in 
the shadow of madness. They kept a close 
watch over him, and at last Bowlin Greene, one 
of the most devoted friends Lincoln then had, 
took him home to his little log cabin, half a mile 
north of New Salem. Here, under the loving 
care of Greene and his good wife Nancy, Lin- 
coln remained until he was once more master of 
himself. 

"But though he had regained self-control, his 
grief was deep and bitter. Ann Rutledge was 
buried in Concord cemetery, a country burying- 
ground seven miles northwest of New Salem. 
To this lonely spot Lincoln frequently journeyed 
to weep over her grave. *My heart is buried 
there,' he said to one of his friends. 

"When McNamar returned (for McNamar's 
story was true, and two months after Ann Rut- 
ledge died he drove into New Salem Avith his 
widowed mother and his brothers and sisters in 
the 'prairie schooner' beside him) and learned of 



LOVE AFFAIRS AND MARRIAGE 141 

Ann's death, he 'saw Lincohi at the post-office/ 
as he afterward said, and 'he seemed desolate 
and sorely distressed.' 

**In later life, when Lincoln's sorrow had be- 
come a memory, he told a friend who questioned 
him: *I really and truly loved the girl and think 
often of her now.' There was a pause, and then 
the President added : 

'' 'And I have loved the name of Rutledge to 
this day.' " 

Lincoln's favorite poem 

"With all his love of fun and frolic," says 
Isaac N. Arnold, "with all his wit and humor, 
with all his laughter and anecdotes, Lincoln, 
from his youth, was a person of deep feeling, 
and there was always mingled with his mirth, 
sadness and melancholy. He always associated 
with the memory of Ann Rutledge the plaintive 
poem which in his hours of melancholy he so 
often repeated, and whose familiar first stanzas 
are as follows: 

Oh, why should the spirit of mortal be proud? 
Like a swift fleeting meteor, a fast flying cloud, 
A flash of the lightning, a break of the wave, 
He passeth from life to his rest in the grave. 

The leaves of the oak and the willow shall fade, 
Be scattered around, and together be laid, 
And the young and the old, and the low and the high 
Shall moulder to dust and together shall lie. 

''Lincoln loved at twilight, or when in the 
country, or in solitude, or when with some con- 
fidential friend, to repeat this poem. I think 
he exaggerated its merits, and I attribute his 



142 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

great love of the poem to Its association with 
Ann Rutledge." It has been surmised that the 
lines may also have been dear to Miss Rutledge 
herself, and that Lincoln may have prized them 
more on that account. 



MARY OWENS 

About three-quarters of a mile north of 
Bowlin Greene's, and on the summit of a hill, 
stood the house of Bennett Able, a small frame 
building eighteen by twenty feet. Able and his 
wife were warm friends of Mr. Lincoln ; and 
many of his rambles through the surrounding 
country, reading and talking to himself, termi- 
nated at their door, where he always found the 
latch-string on the outside, and a hearty wel- 
come within. In October, 1833, ^^^- Lincoln 
met there Miss Mary Owens, a sister of Mrs. 
Able, and, as we shall presently learn from his 
own words, admired her, although not extrava- 
gantly. She remained but four weeks, and then 
went back to her home in Kentucky. 

Miss Owens's mother being dead, her father 
married again ; and Miss Owens, for good rea- 
sons of her own, thought she would rather live 
with her sister than with her stepmother. Ac- 
cordingly, in the fall of 1836, she reappeared at 
Abie's. 

LINCOLN AND MARY OWENS 

Thereafter Mr. Lincoln was unremitting in his 
attentions to her ; and wherever she went he was 
at her side. She had many relatives in the neigh- 
borhood — the Bales, the Greenes, the Grahams — 
and if she went to spend an afternoon or an 



LOVE AFFAIRS AND MARRIAGE 143 

evening with any of these, Lincoln was very 
Hkely to be on hand to conduct her home. He 
asked her to marry him; but she prudently 
evaded a positive answer till she could make up 
her mind about questionable points of his char- 
acter. She did not think him coarse or cruel; 
but she did think him thoughtless, careless, not 
altogether as polite as he might be — in short, 
^'deficient," as she expresses it, ''in those little 
links which make up the great chain of woman's 
happiness." His heart was good, his principles 
were high, his honor sensitive; but still, in the 
eyes of this refined young lady, he did not seem 
to be quite the gentleman. "He was lacking in 
the smaller attentions" ; and, in fact, the whole 
affair is explained when she tells us that ''his 
education was different from" hers. 

WHAT MIGHT HAVE BEEN 

"It appears to me conclusive," says Whitney, 
"that if Lincoln had dealt with this estimable 
and refined young lady in a spirit of his usual 
candor and naturalness, and had properly wooed 
her, there would have been no difficulty in the 
way of a match. Lincoln felt a sense of infe- 
riority, for which the fair charmer gave no oc- 
casion, and he only played at courting, not press- 
ing his suit in the manly and dignified way so 
characteristic of him in other roles. 

"For instance, Nancy Greene was carrying a 
heavy child from her house, up a steep hill, to 
[Abie's house, and was accompanied by Miss 
Owens. It was evident that Mrs. Greene was 
very much exhausted, yet Lincoln, who joined 
and accompanied them, made no offer of assist- 



144 'ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

mice. Miss Owens could not fail to take note of 
her gallant's delinquency, and told her sister, who 
repeated it to Lincoln, that she did not think 
Lincoln would make a good husband. Yet his 
reason was, as he informed Greene, who in- 
formed me, that he was ashamed to be seen by a 
lady of Miss Owens's culture carrying a baby. 
At another time Miss Owens, with Lincoln as 
her escort, went out riding with a party. In 
crossing a deep stream, Lincoln forged on ahead, 
leaving his partner to get on as she could. Being 
reproved for this, he told her she was smart 
enough to get over alone ; but the probabilities 
are that he had embarked upon, and was lost in 
the midst of, some reflections, or else he felt that 
his awkwardness in attempting to be gallant to a 
cultured lady would be worse than neglect. . . . 
"Lincoln wrote her some letters after he set- 
tled in Springfield as a lawyer, but they were of 
a decidedly repelling character; and the lady 
took him at his word. As I have said, he felt 
himself beneath her in a social sense, and the 
mistakes, misunderstandings, and contretemps 
which arose from this anomalous condition of 
affairs prevented, in my judgment, a matri- 
monial union which would have been con- 
genial and prosperous, for Miss Owens was pol- 
ished, brilliant, and amiable, and Lincoln had 
nearly every element to make a good husband." 

PRACTICAL CONSIDERATIONS 

Born in the humblest circumstances, unedu- 
cated, poor, acquainted with flatboats and gro- 
ceries, but a stranger to the drawing-room, it 
was natural that Lincoln should seek in a matri- 



LOVE AFFAIRS AND MARRIAGE. 145 

monial alliance those social advantages which he 
felt were necessary to his political advancement. 
This was, in fact, his own view of the matter, 
and it was strengthened and enforced by the 
counsels of those whom he regarded as friends. 

MARY TODD 

In 1839 Miss Mary, daughter of Hon. Robert 
S. Todd of Lexington, Ky., came to live with 
her sister, Mrs. Ninian W. Edwards, at Spring- 
field. She was young — just twenty-one — her 
family was of the best, and her connections in 
Illinois among the most refined and distinguished 
people. She was gifted with rare talents, had a 
keen sense of the ridiculous, a ready insight into 
the weaknesses of individual character, and a 
most fiery and ungovernable temper. Her tongue 
and her pen were equally sharp. High-bred, 
proud, brilliant, witty, and with a will that often 
swayed others to her purpose, she took Mr. Lin- 
coln captive, although he proved a vacillating 
lover. 

Mr. Lincoln- was a rising politician, fresh from 
the people, and possessed of great power among 
them : Miss Todd was of aristocratic and dis- 
tinguished family, able to lead through the awful 
portals of ''good society" whomsoever they chose 
to countenance. She was very ambitious, and 
even before she left Kentucky announced her 
belief that she was "destined to be the wife of 
some future President." 

''Her sister's spacious dwelling," says James 
Morgan, "was the social centre of the town, and 
Miss Todd never was without attentions and 
admirers. In an open competition among them, 



146 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

Lincoln, poor and awkward, would have been 
easily distanced, for in her train were graceful 
courtiers like Stephen A. Douglas. Notwith- 
standing her pride of family, for she was de- 
scended from governors and generals, her inter- 
est was enlisted in the character of the former 
wood-chopper, and the bright promise of future 
distinction which he wore excited her ambition. 

"irresolution and misery 

"Her family did not look kindly upon her 
preference for him, and the halting and doubt- 
ing suitor himself would have discouraged a less 
resolute woman. She and Lincoln were not 
only opposites in breeding but in temperament 
as well, and the course of their love never ran 
smoothly. Whether in his conflicting emotions 
and morbid presentiments of unhappiness he 
failed her on the appointed wedding day, his- 
tory is not certain. There is no question, how- 
ever, that he brought his relations with her to 
an abrupt end, and plunged into a period of 
desperate melancholy. 

"Friends watched him and cared for him with 
anxious solicitude. He wrote to his partner, 
then in Congress, that he was the most miser- 
able man living, and that if his misery were dis- 
tributed among the human family, there would 
not be one cheerful face on earth. He could 
not tell if he would ever recover; *I awfully 
forebode I shall not.' . . . 

"After months of this unhappy mood a good 
friend, who was going to Kentucky to see his 
betrothed, took Lincoln with him. There the 
heart-sick patient gained some relief amid new 



LOVE AFFAIRS AND MARRIAGE 147 

scenes and faces, and most of all in striving to 
cure his friend, who was strangely stricken with 
the same tormenting doubts in his own love- 
affair. When he had seen this case end in a 
happy marriage and he had returned to Illinois, 
he wrote to the bridegroom with glowing satis- 
faction : *I always was superstitious. I believe 
God made me one of the instruments of bring- 
ing you and Fanny together, which union I have 
no doubt he had foreordained. Whatever he 
designs, he will do for me yet.' 

''Ever present in his mind was the sad plight 
in which he had placed Miss Todd. It was a 
wound in his honor. He reproached himself 
for even wishing to be happy when he thought 
of her whom he had made unhappy. 'That,' he 
wrote, 'still kills my soul.' When he heard, after 
a year, that she had taken a short journey and 
had said she enjoyed it, he exclaimed, 'God be 
praised for that.' " 

QUARREL WITH SHIELDS 

Among the admirers of Miss Todd was James 
Shields, a red-haired little Irishman, with a pep- 
pery temper and an air of inordinate vanity. He 
must have had genuine ability in some direc- 
tions, or else he was wonderfully lucky, for he 
was not only a general in the Mexican War and 
also (in the Federal army) in the Civil War, 
but likewise an ofhce-holder of one kind or an- 
other, in different States of the Union, during 
a great part of his life. 

At this particular time Shields was Auditor of 
the State of Illinois. The State finances were 
in a shocking condition. The State banks were 



148 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

not a success, and the paper currency was nearly- 
worthless, but it was the only money in use, and 
it was the money of the State. In these circum- 
stances, the Governor, Auditor, and Treasurer 
issued a circular forbidding the payment of 
State taxes in the State currency. This was 
clearly an outrage upon the taxpayers. 

Against this Lincoln protested. Not by seri- 
ous argument, but by the merciless satire which 
he knew so well how to use upon occasion. 
Under the pseudonym of "Aunt Rebecca," he 
wrote a letter to the Sangamon Journal. The 
letter was written in the style of Josh Billings, 
and purported to come from a widow residing 
in the ''Lost Townships." It was an attempt 
to laugh down the unjust measure, and in pur- 
suance of this the writer plied Shields with ridi- 
cule. The town was convulsed with laughter, 
and Shields with fury. The wrath of the little 
Irishman was funnier than the letter, and the 
joy of the neighbors increased. 

MARY TODD HELPS ON THE SPORT 

Miss Todd and her friend Miss Jayne, after- 
ward wife of Senator Lyman Trumbull, entered 
into the spirit of the fun. They wrote a letter 
in which "Aunt Rebecca" proposed to soothe his 
injured feelings by accepting Shields as her hus- 
band. This was followed by a doggerel rhyme 
celebrating the event. 

Shields's fury knew no bounds. He went to 
the editor of the paper and demanded the name 
of the author of the letters. The editor con- 
sulted with Lincoln, who was unwilling to per- 
mit any odium to fall on the ladies, and sent 



LOVE AFFAIRS AND MARRIAGE 149 

word to Shields that he would hold himself re- 
sponsible for those letters. 

THE UNFOUGHT DUEL 

If Shields had not been precisely the kind of 
man he was, the matter might have been ex- 
plained and settled amicably. But no, he must 
have blood. He sent an insulting and peremp- 
tory challenge. When Lincoln became convinced 
that a duel was necessary, he exercised his right, 
as the challenged party, of choosing the weapons. 
He selected "broadswords of the largest size." 
This was another triumph of humor. The mid- 
get of an Irishman was to be pitted against the 
giant of six feet four inches, who possessed the 
strength of a Hercules, and the weapons were — 
^'broadswords of the largest size." 

The bloody party repaired to Alton, and thence 
to an island or sand-bar on the Missouri side of 
the river. There a reconciliation was effected, 
honor was satisfied all around, and they returned 
home in good spirits. For some reason Lincoln 
was always ashamed of this farce. Why, we do 
not know. It may have been because he was 
drawn into a situation in which there was a 
possibility of his shedding human blood. And 
he who was too tender-hearted to shoot wild 
game could not make light of that situation. 

MARRIAGE OF LINCOLN AND MARY TODD 

The engagement between Lincoln and Miss 
Todd was renewed, and they were quietly mar- 
ried at the home of the bride's sister, Mrs. Ed- 
wards, November 4, 1842. Lincoln made a 



I50 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

loyal, true, indulgent husband. Mrs. Lincoln 
made a home that was hospitable, cultured, un- 
ostentatious. They lived together till the tragic 
death of the President, more than twenty-two 
years later. 

ROBERT TODD LINCOLN 

They had four children, all boys. Only the 
eldest, Robert Todd Lincoln, grew to manhood. 
He has had a career which is, to say the least, 
creditable to the name he bears. For a few 
months at the close of the war he was on the 
staff of General Grant. He was Secretary of 
War under Garfield, and retained the office 
through the Administration of Arthur. Under 
President Harrison, from 1889 to 1893, he was 
Minister to England. He is a lawyer by profes- 
sion, residing in Chicago — the city that loved his 
father — and at the present writing is president 
of the Pullman Company. 



CHAPTER XIII 

Education and Literary Traits 

The power to which Lincohi attained in fitting 
language to thought is a matter of general won- 
der. It made him the matchless story-teller, and 
gave sublimity to his graver addresses. His thor- 
oughness and accuracy were a source of ad- 
miration and delight to scholars. He had a mas- 
terful grasp of great subjects. He was able to 
look at events from all sides, so as to appreciate 
how they would appear to different grades of 
intelligence, dift"erent classes of people, different 
sections of the country. More than once this 
many-sidedness of his mind saved the country 
from ruin. Wit and humor are usually joined 
with their opposite, pathos, and it is therefore 
not surprising that, being eminent in one, he 
should possess all three characteristics. In his 
conversation humor frequently predominated; in 
his public speeches pure reasoning often deep- 
ened to pathos. 

HOW LINCOLN EDUCATED HIMSELF 

The following account of Lincoln's self-educa- 
tion is given by Hamilton Wright Mabie : 

"Abraham Lincoln is often numbered among 
the uneducated, and his career is pointed out 
among those careers which are supposed to stimu- 
late men who rely wholly on natural capacity, 
native pluck, and ambition. All these qualities 
151 



152 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

Abraham Lincoln had, but I venture to say that 
no man in Abraham Lincoln's time was better 
educated than he, and perhaps no man was so 
well educated as he to do the work which God 
appointed him to do. . . . 

*'few books, but sufficient 

"Lincoln had a few books. It has been said 
that only three books are necessary to make a 
library — the Bible, Shakespeare, and Black- 
stone's Commentaries. All these books Lincoln 
had. But Lincoln had other books as well. He 
had, to begin with, that great literature in sixty- 
six volumes, with which many of us are now 
so unfamiliar, that we call the Bible : a library 
which includes almost every literary form, which 
touches the loftiest heights of human aspiration, 
and sounds the depths of human experience, and 
conveys truth to us in the noblest eloquence both 
of prose and verse. This library was sufficient 
in itself for a man who could read it as Lincoln 
could, without the aid of commentaries, and with 
the flash of the imagination, the power of going 
to the place where a book lives, which is worth 
all other kinds of power in dealing with a book. 
Such a man could be lifted out of provincialism, 
not only into the great movement of the world, 
but into the companionship of some of the loft- 
iest souls that have ever lived, by this single 
book. And then he had that mine of knowledge 
and life and of character, ^sop's Fables, at his 
fingers' ends, so that in all his talk, and in later 
life, these fables served the happiest uses of 
illustration ; and he had that masterpiece of clear 
presentation, Robinson Crusoe. He was inti- 



EDUCATION AND LITERARY TRAITS 153 

mately familiar with that well of English un- 
defiled, which I think more than any other influ- 
ence colored and shaped his style, Bunyan's 
Pilgrim's Progress. 

"thorough mastery of reading 

''He borrowed that old-fashioned book which 
is responsible for a great deal of misinformation 
— Weems's Life of Washington — and when in 
1 86 1 he spoke in the Senate at Trenton he said 
that so thoroughly had he absorbed that book 
that he could see Washington crossing the Dela- 
ware, and he could recall all the details of the 
brilliant march on Trenton and the brilliant 
march on Princeton. Later he came upon 
Shakespeare and Burns, whom he learned after- 
ward to love, and whom he knew so intimately 
that he became an acute critic of both writers. 
Now, the man who knows his Shakespeare 
knows pretty much all that is to be known of 
life; and if he can put the Bible back of it he 
has a complete education. 

"what he told the professor 

"Years afterward, when he was making those 
marvelous speeches which began in Cooper 
Union, a professor of English in one of our 
universities who went to hear him, attracted by 
his attitude on public questions, was astonished 
at his command of English, the purity, lucidity, 
and persuasiveness of his style. He heard him 
three times in succession, and then called at his 
hotel and sent up his card, and when Mr. Lin- 
coln came into the room he said to him, 'Mr. 



154 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

Lincoln, I have come here to ask you a single 
question: where did you get your style?' Mr. 
Lincoln was astonished to know he had such a 
thing as style, but the question being pressed 
home to him, he thought a minute and said: 
'When I was a boy I began, and kept up for 
many years afterward, the practice of taking 
note of every word spoken during the day or 
read during the day which I did not understand, 
and after I went to bed at night I thought of it 
in connection with the other words until I saw 
its meaning, and then I translated it into some 
simpler word which I knew.' 

"the best education 

*'Now, if you knew The Pilgrim's Progress by 
heart, and if you made it a practice every night 
to translate everything you had heard during the 
day into language of the quality of The Pilgrim's 
Progress, there is no English education, I ven- 
ture to say, in any university, which would so 
thoroughly equip you to a command of language 
and the power of persuasion. And that was the 
way that Abraham Lincoln learned to use the 
kind of English that he had at his fingers' ends." 

THE SECOND INAUGURAL 

Consider Lincoln's second inaugural, delivered 
March 4, 1865. There was in this little to dis- 
cuss, for he had no new policy to proclaim, he 
was simply to continue the policy of the past four 
years, of which the country had shown its ap- 
proval by reelecting him. The end of the war 
was almost in sight ; it would soon be finished. 



EDUCATION AND LITERARY TRAITS 155 

In this address breathes a spirit of grandeur. 
Isaiah was a prophet who was also a statesman. 
Lincoln — we say it with reverence — was a states- 
man who was also a prophet. He had foresight. 
He had msight. He saw the hand of God shap- 
ing events ; he saw the spirit of God in events. 
Such is his spiritual elevation of thought, such 
his tenderness of yearning, that there is no one 
but Isaiah to whom we may fittingly compare 
him, in the manly piety of his closing words in 
this inaugural: 

*'With malice toward none, with charity for 
all, with firmness in the right, as God gives us 
to see the right, let us strive on to finish the 
work we are in ; to bind up the nation's wounds ; 
to care for him who shall have borne the battle, 
and for his widow, and his orphan ; to do all 
which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting 
peace among ourselves, and with all nations." 

The study of his principal speeches and papers 
(contained in the present edition) will enable one 
to understand the salient points of his political 
philosophy, and incidentally the secret of his in- 
tellectual development. These are not enough 
completely to show the man Lincoln, but they do 
give a true idea of the great statesman. They 
show a symmetrical and wonderful growth. 
Great as was his *'House-divided-against-itself" 
speech (1858), there is yet a wide difference 
between that and the second inaugural ; and the 
seven years intervening accomplished this growth 
of mind and of spirit only because they were 
years of great stress. 

Apart from all his other utterances, by reason 
of its tender associations, but one with the sec- 
ond inaugural in its noble strain, stands the ad- 



156 'ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

dress at the dedication of Gettysburg Cemetery, 
November 19, 1863. This was not intended for 
an oration. Edward Everett was the orator of 
the occasion. Lincoln's part was to pronounce 
the formal words of dedication. It was a busy 
time — all times were busy with him, but this 
was unusually busy — and he wrote the address 
on a sheet of foolscap, in such odd moments as 
he could command. In form it is prose, but in 
effect it is a poem. Many of its sentences are 
rhythmical. The occasion lifted him into a 
higher realm of thought. The hearers were im- 
pressed by his unusual gravity and solemnity of 
manner quite as much, perhaps, as by the words 
themselves. They were awed, many were moved 
to tears. The address follows in full. 

THE GETTYSBURG ADDRESS 

"Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers 
brought forth on this continent a new nation, 
conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the propo- 
sition that all men are created equal. Now we 
are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether 
that nation, or any nation so conceived and so 
dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a 
great battlefield of that war. We have come to 
dedicate a portion of that field as a final resting- 
place for those who here gave their lives that 
that nation might live. It is altogether fitting 
and proper that we should do this. But, in a 
larger sense, we cannot dedicate — we cannot con- 
secrate — we cannot hallow^ — this ground. The 
brave men, living and dead, who struggled here 
have consecrated it far above our poor power to 
add or detract. The world will little note, nor 



EDUCATION AND LITERARY TRAITS 157 

long remember, what we say here, but it can 
never forget what they did here. It is for us, the 
Hving, rather, to be dedicated here to the un- 
finished work which they who fought here have 
thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us 
to be here dedicated to the great task remaining 
before us — that from these honored dead we 
take increased devotion to that cause for which 
they gave the last full measure of devotion — that 
we here highly resolve that these dead shall not 
have died in vain — that this nation, under God, 
shall have a new birth of freedom — and that 
government of the people, by the people, for the 
people, shall not perish from the earth." 

COMPARISONS 

The simplicity and sublimity of these sen- 
tences, which for their purpose have never, ac- 
cording to Charles Sumner, been equaled since 
Simonides wrote the epitaph for the Spartans 
who fell at Thermopylae, surpass our power of 
characterization. It is worth while, however, to 
call attention to the fact that three-quarters of 
the address is composed of Anglo-Saxon words 
of one syllable ! 

At the moment of its delivery the address was 
not generally appreciated. But after a few days 
the public awoke to the fact that Lincoln's ''few 
remarks" were immeasurably superior to Ever- 
ett's brilliant and learned oration. Sumner, as 
we have said, compared it to the words of Si- 
monides, and it has also been compared to the 
oration of Pericles in memory of the Athenian 
dead who fell in the Peloponnesian War. Com- 
petent judges have said that there has been no 



158 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

memorial oration from that date to Lincoln*s 
Gettysburg Address of equal power. The two 
orations are very different : Lincoln's was less 
than three hundred words long, that of Pericles 
near three thousand. But both orators alike ap- 
preciated the glory of sacrifice for one's country. 
And it is safe to predict that this Gettysburg 
Address, brief, hastily prepared, underestimated 
by its author, will last as long as the Republic 
itself, as long as English speech shall endure. 

Lincoln's style compared with seward's 

Secretary Seward was a brilliant scholar, a pol- 
ished writer, a trained diplomatist. But in liter- 
ary matters Lincoln was plainly the master and 
Seward was the pupil. We select from an ad- 
mirable article by Richard Watson Gilder, en- 
titled ''Lincoln as a Writer," the following pas- 
sage comparing the literary style of these two 
men. 

"The first inaugural concludes with a passage 
of great tenderness. We learn from Nicolay 
and Hay that the suggestion of that passage, its 
first draft indeed, came from Seward. But com- 
pare this first draft with the passage as amended 
and adopted by Lincoln ! This is Seward's : 

** T close. We are not, we must not be, aliens 
or enemies, but fellow-countrymen and brethren. 
Although passion has strained our bonds of af- 
fection too hardly, they must not, I am sure they 
will not, be broken. The mystic chords which, 
proceeding from so many battlefields and so 
many patriot graves, pass through all the hearts 
and all hearths in this broad continent of ours, 
will yet again harmonize in their ancient music 



EDUCATION AND LITERARY TRAITS 159 

when breathed upon by the guardian angel of the 
nation.' And this is Lincohi's : 

" 'I am loath to close. We are not enemies, 
but friends. We must not be enemies. Though 
passion may have strained, it must not break our 
bonds of affection. The mystic chords of mem- 
ory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot 
grave to every living heart and hearthstone all 
over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus 
of the Union when again touched, as surely they 
will be, by the better angels of our nature.' " 

It requires no trained critical faculty to see 
that this passage as amended by Lincoln is a 
marked improvement on the original by Seward. 
It shows that Lincoln had by far the better com- 
mand of vigorous, precise, and melodious Eng- 
lish. 



CHAPTER XIV 

Personal Characteristics : Physical and 
Mental 

In considering Lincoln's great stature of six 
feet and four inches, it has been often noted that 
his length of leg was out of all proportion to his 
body-length, and his figure and movements have 
commonly been described as awkward. Expert 
students of anatomy and eminent artists have 
nevertheless credited him with admirable physi- 
cal proportions and endowments, including a 
natural grace, but with characters so unique as to 
escape recognition by eyes accustomed to see men 
cast in the ordinary mould. 

His usual weight was about one hundred 
and eighty pounds. He was thin through the 
breast, narrow across the shoulders, and had the 
general appearance of a consumptive subject. 
Standing up, he stooped slightly forward ; sitting 
down, he usually crossed his long legs, or threw 
them over the arms of the chair, as the most 
convenient mode of disposing of them. His 
''head was long, and tall from the base of the 
brain and the eyebrow" ; his forehead high and 
narrow, but inclining backward as it rose. The 
size of his hat was seven and an eighth. There 
was a large mole on his right cheek, and an un- 
commonly prominent Adam's apple on his throat. 

His countenance was haggard and careworn, 
exhibiting all the marks of deep and protracted 
suffering. Every feature of the man — the hol- 
i6o 



PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS i6i 

low eyes, with the dark rings beneath ; the long, 
sallow, cadaverous face, intersected by peculiar 
deep lines ; his whole air ; his walk ; his long, 
silent reveries, broken at long intervals by sud- 
den and startling exclamations, as if to confound 
an observer who might suspect the nature of his 
thoughts — showed he was a man of sorrows, not 
sorrows of to-day or yesterday, but long-treas- 
ured and deep, bearing with him a continual 
sense of weariness and pain. 

THE EVERY-DAY LINCOLN 

On a winter's morning, when he lived in 
Springfield, this man could be seen wending his 
way to the market, with a basket on his arm, 
and a little boy at his side, whose small feet 
rattled and pattered over the ice-bound pave- 
ment, attempting to make up by the number of 
his short steps for the long strides of his father. 
The little fellow jerked at the bony hand which 
held his, and prattled and questioned, begged 
and grew petulant, in a vain effort to make his 
father talk to him. But the latter was probably 
unconscious of the other's existence, and stalked 
on, absorbed in his own reflections. 

As he moved along thus silent, abstracted, his 
thoughts dimly reflected in his sharp face, men 
turned to look after him as an object of sym- 
pathy as well as curiosity: ''his melancholy," in 
the words of Mr. Herndon, ''dripped from him 
as he walked." If, however, he met a friend 
in the street, and was roused by a loud, hearty 
"Good-morning, Lincoln!" he would grasp the 
friend's hand with one or both of his own, and 
with his usual expression of "Howdy, howdy," 



1 62 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

would detain him to hear a story : something 
reminded him of it; it happened in Indiana, and 
it must be told, for it was wonderfully pertinent. 

IN HIS OFFICE 

After his breakfast-hour, he would appear at 
his office, and go about the labors of the day with 
all his might, displaying prodigious industry and 
capacity for continuous application, although he 
never was a fast worker. Sometimes it hap- 
pened that he came without his breakfast; and 
then he would have in his hands a piece of 
cheese, or Bologna sausage, and a few crackers, 
bought by the way. At such times he did not 
speak to his partner Herndon, nor to his friends, 
if any happened to be present : the tears were, 
perhaps, struggling into his eyes, while his pride 
was struggling to keep them back. Mr. Hern- 
don knew the whole story at a glance : there was 
no speech between them ; but neither wished the 
visitors to the office to witness the scene ; and, 
therefore, Mr. Lincoln retired to the back office, 
while Mr. Herndon locked the front one, and 
walked away with the key in his pocket. In an 
hour or more the latter would return, and per- 
haps find Mr. Lincoln calm and collected ; other- 
wise he went out again, and waited until he was 
so. Then the office was opened, and everything 
went on as usual. 

When Mr. Lincoln had a speech to write, 
which happened very often, he would put down 
each thought, as it struck him, on a small strip 
of paper, and, having accumulated a number of 
these, generally carried them in his hat or his 
pockets until he had the whole speech composed 



PERSONAL CHARACTERI^ riCS 163 

in this odd way, when he would sit down at his 
table, connect the fragments, and then write out 
the whole speech on consecutive sheets in a 
plain, legible handwriting. 

IN HIS HOME 

Mrs. Chapman, daughter of Dennis Hanks, 
and therefore a relative of Mr. Lincoln, made 
him a long visit previous to her marriage. "You 
ask me," she said to an inquirer, "how Mr. Lin- 
coln acted at home. I can say, and that truly, 
he was all that a husband, father, and neighbor 
should be — kind and affectionate to his wife and 
child ('Bob' being the only one they had when 
I was with them), and very pleasant to all 
around him. Never did I hear him utter an 
unkind word. For instance : one day he under- 
took to correct his child, and his wife was deter- 
mined that he should not, and attempted to take 
it from him; but in this she failed. She then 
tried 'tongue-lashing,' but met with the same 
fate; for Mr. Lincoln corrected his child as a 
father ought to do, in the face of his wife's 
anger, and that, too, without even changing his 
countenance or making any reply to his wife. 

"His favorite way of reading, when at home, 
was lying down on the floor. I fancy I see him 
now, lying full-length in the hall of his old house 
reading. When not engaged reading law books, 
he would read literary works, and was very fond 
of reading poetry, and often, when he would be, 
or appear to be, in deep study, commence and 
repeat aloud some piece that he had taken a 
fancy to. He often told laughable jokes and sto- 
ries when he thought we were looking gloomy." 



1 64 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 



LITERARY TASTES 

Some of Mr. Lincoln's literary tastes indicated 
strongly his prevailing gloominess of mind. He 
read Byron extensively, especially CJiilde Har- 
old, The Dream, and Don Juan. Burns, as we 
have seen, was one of his earliest favorites. 
"Holy Willie's Prayer" he memorized. Of 
Shakespeare, he especially liked Macbeth, King 
Lear, and The Merry Wives of Windsor. But 
whatever was suggestive of death, the grave, the 
sorrows of man's days on earth, charmed his dis- 
consolate spirit, and captivated his sympathetic 
heart. Solemn-sounding rhymes, with no merit 
but the sad music of their numbers, were more 
enchanting to him than the loftiest songs of the 
masters. Of these were, *'Oh ! Why should the 
Spirit of Mortal be Proud?" and a pretty com- 
monplace little piece, entitled ''The Inquiry." To 
take an example of high-class poetry, one verse 
of Holmes's "Last Leaf" he thought "inexpress- 
ibly touching." 

The mossy marbles rest 
On the lips that he has prest 

In their bloom ; 
And the names he loved to hear 
Have been carved for many a year 

On the tomb. 



HUMOR 

Lincoln frequently said that he lived by his 
humor, and would have died without it. His 
manner of telling a story was irresistibly comical, 
the fun of it dancing in his eyes and playing 
over every feature. His face changed in an in- 



PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS 165 

stant, the hard lines faded out of it, and the 
mirth seemed to diffuse itself all over him, ''like 
a spontaneous tickle." You could see it coming 
long before he opened his mouth, and he began 
to enjoy the point before his eager auditors could 
catch the faintest glimpse of it. Telling and 
hearing ridiculous stories was one of his ruling 
passions. 

Judges, lawyers, jurors, and suitors carried 
home with them select budgets of his stories, to 
be retailed to itching ears as ''Old Abe's last." 
When the court adjourned from village to vil- 
lage, the taverns and the groceries left behind 
were filled with the sorry echoes of his "best." 
He generally located his little narratives with 
great precision — in Kentucky, Indiana, Illinois ; 
and if he was not personally "knowing" to the 
facts himself, he was intimately acquainted with 
a gentleman who was. 

Lincoln used his stories variously — to illus- 
trate or convey an argument; to make his opin- 
ions clear to another, or conceal them alto- 
gether; to cut off a disagreeable conversation, 
or to end an unprofitable discussion ; to cheer his 
own heart, or simply to amuse his friends. But 
most frequently he had a practical object in view, 
and employed them simply "as labor-saving con- 
trivances." 

THE POLITICIAN 

"Lincoln," says Charles A. Dana, in his Rec- 
ollections of the Civil War, "was a supreme poli- 
tician. He understood politics because he un- 
derstood human nature. I had an illustration 
of this in the spring of 1864. The Administra- 
tion had decided that the Constitution of the 



1 66 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

United States should be amended so that slavery 
should be prohibited. This was not only a 
change in our national policy, it was also a most 
important military measure. It was intended 
not merely as a means of abolishing slavery for- 
ever, but as a means of affecting the judgment 
and the feelings and the anticipations of those 
in rebellion. It was believed that such an 
amendment to the Constitution would be equiva- 
lent to new armies in the field, that it would be 
worth at least a million men, that it would be 
an intellectual army that would tend to paralyze 
the enemy and break the continuity of his ideas. 

'*In order thus to amend the Constitution, it 
was necessary first to have the proposed amend- 
ment approved by three-fourths of the States. 
When that question came to be considered, the 
issue was seen to be so close that one State more 
was necessary. The State of Nevada was organ- 
ized and admitted to the Union to answer that 
purpose. I have sometimes heard people com- 
plain of Nevada as superfluous and petty, not 
big enough to be a State ; but when I hear that 
complaint, I always hear Abraham Lincoln say- 
ing:^ 

" Tt is easier to admit Nevada than to raise 
another million soldiers.' " 

PROFOUND IN THOUGHT, STRONG IN STATEMENT 

Lincoln was in no sense a brilliant conversa- 
tionalist, yet he was so logical in his discourse 
and his illustrations were so pertinent, that he 
always commanded the attention, and seldom 
failed to excite the admiration of his listeners. 
John B. Alley tells us that in conversation with 



PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS 167 

some of the most eminent Senators during Lin- 
coln's Administration, it was remarked that the 
President had said some things which exhibited 
more profound thought, more intellectual grasp, 
and more power of statement than anything that 
had ever been said before. The Gettysburg Ad- 
dress may well be cited in support of such 
judgment. 

HIS PATIENCE ABUSED 

"He was an exceedingly patient and even- 
tempered man," says Alley. "I have often seen 
him placed in the most provoking and trying 
positions, and never but once knew him to lose 
his temper. That was the day after he had re- 
ceived very bad news from the army. A couple 
of office-seekers who knew him well intercepted 
him, on his way from the White House to the 
War Department, and teased him for an office 
which he told them he could not give. They 
persisted in their importunity until it was un- 
bearable. The President, evidently worn out by 
care and anxiety, turned upon them, and such 
an angry and terrific tirade, against those two 
incorrigible bores, I never before heard from the 
lips of mortal man." 



CHAPTER XV 

Personal Characteristics : Moral and 
Religious 

The sobriquet "Honest Abe," which his neigh- 
bors fastened on Lincoln in his youth, was never 
lost, shaken off, or outgrown. It meant some- 
thing more than such exactness of commercial 
honesty as forbade him to touch a penny of the 
funds that remained over from the extinct post- 
office of New Salem, though the Government 
was for years negligent in the matter of settling 
up. In youth, as we have seen, he always in- 
sisted on fairness in sports, so that he came to 
be the standing umpire of the neighborhood. The 
same honesty came out also in his practice of 
the law, when he would not lend his influence 
to further scoundrel schemes, nor consent to take 
an unfair advantage of an opponent. 

HIS PUBLIC PROBITY 

But the glory of his honesty appeared in his 
Administration. It is a remarkable fact that 
there was never any suspicion, even among his 
enemies, that he used the high powers of his 
office for gain, or for the furtherance of his 
political ambition. When contracts, to the 
amount of many millions of dollars, were being 
constantly given out for a period of four years, 
there was never a thought that a dishonest dol- 
lar would find its way, either directly or indi- 
i68 



PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS 169 

rectly, into the hands of the President, or with 
his consent into the hands of his friends. When 
he was a candidate for reelection he was fully 
aware that some officials of high station were 
using their influence for the purpose of injuring 
him. It was in his power to dismiss these in 
disgrace, and they deserved it. This he refused 
to do. So long as they did well their official 
duties he overlooked their injustice to him. No 
President has surpassed him in the cleanness of 
his record, and only Washington, perhaps, has 
equaled him. 

HIS MAGNANIMITY AND FORBEARANCE 

The greatness of Lincoln's spirit was shown 
in the forming of his Cabinet and in his relations 
with its members. Certain acts on the part of 
Seward and Chase would have led almost any 
other man in the President's place to dismiss 
them summarily. But, thanks to Lincoln's pa- 
tience and sagacity, Seward, as Secretary of 
State, became not only useful to the country, but 
devotedly loyal to his chief. After Chase's vol- 
untary retirement from the Treasury Depart- 
ment, Lincoln appointed him Chief Justice. To 
his credit be it said that he adorned the jucW 
ciary, although he never did appreciate the itt^i 
who saved him from oblivion, if not disgr'S^! 
Up to the year 1862, Lincoln's only pQvihK%\ 
knowledge of Stanton was such as to rd&l^^fe^-^ 
sions of resentment, but when he be!l^^eel'^4hi'^ 
Stanton would make a good Secr^^r^^^f WSr 
he did not hesitate to appoint him.^ffeii^^ feleW 
say that this appointment gave Sl§fttdfi'^h§'^gF6aP 
est surprise of his life. ^»i ^^^^ ^^ .odiioli 



ABRAHAM LINCOLN 



FIRMNESS IN THE RIGHT 

The President was always ready to set aside 
his own preference, and to do the expedient 
thing, when no moral principle was involved. 
When such a principle was involved he was 
ready to stand alone against the world. He was 
never known to betray cowardice. In early 
youth he championed the cause of temperance in 
a community where the use of liquors was almost 
universal. In the Illinois Legislature and in Con- 
gress he expressed his repugnance to the insti- 
tution of slavery, although this expression could 
do him no possible good politically, while it 
might do him infinite harm. When he practised 
law, he was one of comparatively few lawyers 
of ability who did not dread the odium sure to 
attach to those who befriended negroes. 

In 1 86 1 he stood out almost alone against the 
clamors of his constituents and directed the re- 
lease of Mason and Slidell. 



PERSONAL HABITS 

Personally he was a clean man. The mascu- 
line vices were abhorrent to him. He was not 
profane. He was not vulgar. He was as far 
removed from suspicion as Caesar could have 
demanded of his wife. He did not drink intoxi- 
cants. When a young man, he could not be 
tricked into swallowing whiskey. At the close 
of the war a barrel of whiskey was sent him 
from some cellar in Richmond, as a souvenir of 
the fall of the city, but he declined to receive it. 
If wine was served at the table of the White 
House, it was in deference to foreign guests. 



PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS 171 

!As a matter of courtesy he went through the 
form of touching the glass to his Hps, but he 
never drank. How widely in such things his 
life separated him from many of his associates ! 
The atmosphere of the White House has been 
sweeter and purer ever since he occupied it, and 
this is largely due to the influence of his own 
incorruptible purity. 

TRIUMPHS OF COURAGE 

"Dining with Mr. Herndon in Springfield," 
says Thomas Hicks, *T asked about his [Lin- 
coln's] courage ; he answered me by saying : 
^Lincoln never had any personal fear, and he 
has the courage of a lion. In the old political 
struggles in this State, I have seen him go upon 
the platform, when a dozen revolvers were 
drawn on him, but before he had spoken twenty 
words they would go back into the pockets of 
their owners ; and such were the methods of his 
eloquence that, likely as not these men would 
be the first to shake hands with him when he 
came among them after the meeting. Lincoln 
is a number one man in every way.' " 

Isaac N. Arnold describes the way in which, 
during an Illinois canvass in 1840, Lincoln pro- 
tected Edward D. Baker from a mob which 
threatened to drag him off the stand. Baker 
was speaking in a large room, rented and used 
for the court sessions, and Lincoln's office was 
in an apartment over the court-room, and com- 
municating with it by a trap-door. Lincoln was 
in his office, listening to Baker through the open 
trap-door, when Baker, becoming excited, abused 
the Democrats, many of whom were present. A 



172 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

cry was raised, "Pull him off the stand!" The 
instant Lincoln heard the cry, knowing a general 
fight was imminent, his athletic form was seen 
descending from above through the opening of 
the trap-door, and springing to the side of Baker, 
and waving his hand for silence, he said with 
dignity: ''Gentlemen, let us not disgrace the age 
and country in which we live. This is a land 
where freedom of speech is guaranteed. Baker 
has a right to speak, and a right to be permitted 
to do so. I am here to protect him, and no man 
shall take him from this stand if I can prevent 
it." Quiet was restored, and Baker finished his 
speech without further interruption. 

THE PRESIDENT AND THE CHILDREN 

Dana, in his Recollections, narrates the fol- 
lowing pleasing incidents : 

'Tt was not only in matters of life and death 
that Mr. Lincoln was merciful. He was kind 
at heart toward all the world. I never heard him 
say an unkind thing about anybody. Now and 
then he would laugh at something jocose or 
satirical that somebody had done or said, but it 
was always pleasant humor. He would never 
allow the wants of any man or woman to go 
unattended to if he could help it. I noticed his 
sweetness of nature particularly with his little 
son, a child at that time perhaps seven or nine 
years old, who used to roam the departments, 
and whom everybody called 'Tad.' He had a 
defective palate, and couldn't speak very plainly. 
Often I have sat by his father, reporting to him 
some important matter that I had been ordered 
to inquire into, and he would have this boy on his 



PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS 173 

knee. While he would perfectly understand the 
report, the striking thing about him was his 
affection for the child. 

''He was good to everybody. Once there was 
a great gathering at the White House on New 
Year's Day, and all the diplomats came in their 
uniforms, and all the officers of the army and 
navy in Washington were in full costume. A 
little girl of mine said, 'Papa, couldn't you take 
me over to see that ?' I said, 'Yes' ; so I took 
her over and put her in a corner, where she be- 
held this gorgeous show. When it was finished, 
I went up to Mr. Lincoln and said, 'I have a 
little girl here who wants to shake hands with 
you.' He went over to her, and took her up 
and kissed her and talked to her. She will never 
forget it if she lives to be a thousand years old." 

Lincoln's religious views 

Jesse W. Fell of Illinois, who had the best 
opportunities of knowing Lincoln intimately, 
makes the following statement of his religious 
opinions, derived from repeated conversations 
with him on the subject: 

"On the innate depravity of man, the char- 
acter and office of the great Head of the Church, 
the atonement, the infallibility of the written 
revelation, the performance of miracles, the na- 
ture and design of present and future rewards 
and punishments (as they are popularly called), 
and many other subjects, he held opinions utterly 
at variance with what are usually taught in the 
Church. I should say that his expressed views 
on these and kindred topics were such as, in the 
estimation of most believers, would place him 



174 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

entirely outside the Christian pale. Yet, to my 
mind, such was not the true position, since his 
principles and practices and the spirit of his 
whole life were of the very kind we universally 
agree to call Christian; and I think this conclu- 
sion is in no wise affected by the circumstance 
that he never attached himself to any religious 
society whatever. 

"His religious views were eminently practical, 
and are summed up, as I think, in these two 
propositions: 'the Fatherhood of God, and the 
brotherhood of man.' He fully believed in a 
superintending and overruling Providence, that 
guides and controls the operations of the world, 
but maintained that law and order, and not their 
violation or suspension, are the appointed means 
by which this providence is exercised." 

According to his law partner, Herndon, "in 
one sense of the word, Mr. Lincoln was a Uni- 
versalist, and in another sense he was a Uni- 
tarian ; but he was a theist, as we now un- 
derstand that word ; he was so fully, freely, 
unequivocally, boldly, and openly, when asked for 
his views. Mr. Lincoln," continues Herndon, 
"was supposed by many people to be an atheist. 
I can put that supposition at rest forever. I hold 
a letter of Mr. Lincoln in my hand, addressed to 
his stepbrother, John D. Johnston, and dated the 
twelfth day of January, 1851. He had heard 
from Johnston that his father, Thomas Lincoln, 
was sick, and that no hopes of his recovery were 
entertained. Mr. Lincoln wrote back to Mr. 
Johnston these words : 

" *I sincerely hope that father may yet recover 
his health ; but, at all events, tell him to remem- 
ber to call upon and confide in One great and 



PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS i75 

good and merciful Maker, who will not turn 
away from him in any extremity. He notes the 
fall of a sparrow, and numbers the hairs of our 
heads ; and he will not forget the dying man who 
puts his trust in him. Say to him, that, if we 
could meet now, it is doubtful whether it would 
not be more painful than pleasant ; but that, if 
it be his lot to go now, he will soon have a joyous 
meeting with many loved ones gone before, and 
where the rest of us, through the help of God, 
hope ere long to join them. A. Lincoln.' 

'' . . . It has been said to me that Mr. Lincoln 
wrote the above letter to an old man simply to 
cheer him up in his last moments, and that the 
writer did not believe what he said. The ques- 
tion is. Was Mr. Lincoln an honest and truthful 
man? If he was, he wrote that letter honestly, 
believing it. It has to me the sound, the ring, 
of an honest utterance. I admit that Mr. Lin- 
coln, in his moments of melancholy and terrible 
gloom, was living on the borderland between 
theism and atheism — sometimes quite wholly 
dwelling in atheism. In his happier moments he 
would swing back to theism, and dwell lovingly 
there. It is possible that Mr. Lincoln was not 
always responsible for what he said or thought, 
so deep, so intense, so terrible, was his melan- 
choly. I maintain that Mr. Lincoln was a deeply 
religious man at all times and places, in spite of 
his transient doubts.'' 

THE '^SUNDAY ORDER" 

The religious strain that runs through Lin- 
coln's papers and addresses is known to all, and 
it need not be dwelt on here. But the ** Sunday 



176 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

Order," which follows, should have special re- 
membrance, as showing how the President in 
war-time was practically mindful of religious 
things. 

*'The importance for man and beast of the 
prescribed weekly rest, the sacred rights of 
Christian soldiers and sailors, a becoming defer- 
ence to the best sentiment of a Christian people, 
and a due regard for the Divine will, demand 
that Sunday labor in the army and navy be re- 
duced to the measure of strict necessity. The 
discipline and character of the national forces 
should not suffer, nor the cause they defend be 
imperiled, by the profanation of the day or the 
name of the Most High." 



CHAPTER XVI 
Nomination and Election 

At the beginning of the year i860 Lincoln 
was in no sense in the race for the Presidential 
nomination. About that time a list of twenty- 
one names of possible condidates was published 
in New York; Lincoln's name was not on the 
list. A list of thirty-five was published in Phila- 
delphia. Lincoln's name was not on that list. 
After the speech at Cooper Listitute the New 
York Evening Post mentioned Lincoln's name 
along with others. That was the only case in the 
East. 

In Illinois his candidacy developed in Febru- 
ary and came to a head at the Republican State 
convention at Decatur. Lincoln's name had been 
prominent in the preceding local conventions, 
and the enthusiasm was growing. When Abra- 
ham Lincoln came into this convention he was 
greeted with an outburst of enthusiasm. After 
order had been restored, the chairman, Governor 
Oglesby, announced that an old-time Macon 
County Democrat desired to make a contribution 
to the convention. The ofifer being accepted, a 
banner was borne up the hall upon two old 
fence-rails. This, of course, was especially cal- 
culated to rouse the members of the conven- 
tion to the highest pitch of excitement. The 
whole affair was gaily decorated and the in- 
scription was : 

177 



178 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

[ABRAHAM LINCOLN, 
THE RAIL CANDIDATE 

FOR PRESIDENT IN i860. 

Two Rails from a Lot of 3,000 Made in 1830 by 

Thos. Hanks and Abe Lincoln — Whose 

Father was the First Pioneer of 

Macon County. 

This incident was the means of enlarging the 
sobriquet ''Honest Abe" to "Honest Old Abe, 
the Rail-splitter." The enthusiasm over the rails 
spread far and wide. That he had split rails, 
and that he even had done it well, was no test 
of his statesmanship. But it was a reminder of 
his humble origin, and it attached him to the 
common people, between whom and himself 
there had always been a warm feeling of mutual 
sympathy. 

THE NATIONAL CONVENTION AND ITS NOMINEE 

The second Republican national convention 
met in Chicago, May i6, i860. A temporary 
wooden structure, called a wigwam, had been 
built for the purpose. It was, for those days, 
a very large building, and would accommodate 
about ten thousand persons. 

The most prominent candidate for the nomi- 
nation was William H. Seward of New York. 
He had had thirty years of experience in political 
life. He was a man of wide learning, fine cul- 
ture, unequaled as a diplomatist ; he was a pa- 
triot, a statesman, and loyal to the principles of 
the Republican party. He had a plurality of the 
delegates by a wide margin, though not a major- 



NOMINATION AND ELECTION 179 

ity. It seemed a foregone conclusion that he 
would be nominated. Horace Greeley, who was 
determinedly opposed to him, gave up the contest 
and telegraphed to his paper, the Nezv York Trib- 
une, that Seward would be nominated. The op- 
position, he said, could not unite on any one man. 

The next most prominent name was Lincoln's. 
He had the full delegation of Illinois, who, at 
Decatur, had been instructed to vote for him as 
**the first and only choice" of the State. He had 
many votes, too, from the neighboring States. 

Besides these two candidates before the con- 
vention, there were half a dozen others, all 
"favorite sons" of their own States, but at no 
time developing any great strength. 

Now came in a political ruse which has been 
often used in later years. Seward's friends had 
taken to Chicago an army of claqueurs, number- 
ing nearly or quite two thousand. These were 
distributed through the audience and were ap- 
parently under orders to shout whenever Sew- 
ard's name was mentioned. This gave the ap- 
pearance of spontaneous applause and seemed to 
arouse great enthusiasm for the candidate. 

Lincoln's friends soon came to understand the 
situation and planned to beat their rivals at their 
own game. They sent out into the country and 
secured two men with phenomenal voices. It 
was said, with playful exaggeration, that these 
two men could shout so as to be heard across 
Lake Michigan. They were made captains of 
two stentorian bands of followers. These were 
placed on opposite sides of the auditorium and 
were instructed to raise the shout at a precon- 
certed signal and keep it up as long as desired. 
The plan worked. 



i8o ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

Leonard Swett describes the result: "Caleb B. 
Smith of Indiana then seconded the nomination 
of Lincoln, and the West came to his rescue. No 
mortal before ever saw such a scene. The idea 
of us Hoosiers and Suckers being out-screamed 
would have been as bad to them as the loss of 
their man. Five thousand people at once leaped 
to their seats, women not wanting in the num- 
ber, and the wild yell made soft vesper breath- 
ings of all that had preceded. No language can 
describe it. A thousand steam-whistles, ten acres 
of hotel gongs, a tribe of Comanches headed by 
a choice vanguard from pandemonium, might 
have mingled in the scene unnoticed." 



GIDDINGS AND CURTIS 

A dramatic scene had occurred at the adop- 
tion of the platform. When the first resolution 
was read, Joshua R. Giddings, an old-time abo- 
litionist of the extreme type, moved as an amend- 
ment to incorporate the words from the Declara- 
tion of Independence which announce the right 
of all men to ''life, liberty, and the pursuit of 
happiness." The hostility to this amendment was 
not so much owing to an objection to the phrase, 
as to its being introduced upon the motion of so 
extreme a partisan as Giddings. The new party 
was made up of men of various old parties, and 
it was important that the moderate Democrats 
should not be antagonized by the extreme abo- 
litionists. The motion was lost by a decided 
vote, and the old man, almost broken-hearted, 
left the hall amid the protestations of his asso- 
ciates. 

Then came to his rescue a man, about thirty- 



NOMINATION AND ELECTION i8i 

six years of age, not yet widely known, but who 
afterward more than once decidedly influenced 
Republican conventions at a critical stage of 
their proceedings. It was George William Cur- 
tis of New York. When the second resolution 
was under consideration he presented the amend- 
ment of Giddings in a form slightly modified. 
He then urged it in an impassioned speech, and 
by his torrent of eloquence carried the enthu- 
siasm of the convention with him. *'I have to 
ask this convention," he concluded, "whether they 
are prepared to go upon the record before the 
country as voting down the words of the Decla- 
ration of Independence. ... I rise simply to 
ask gentlemen to think well before, upon the free 
prairies of the West, in the summer of i860, 
they dare to wince and quail before the assertion 
of the men of Philadelphia in 1776 — before they 
dare to shrink from repeating the words that 
these great men enunciated." 

The amendment was adopted in a storm of 
applause. Giddings, overjoyed at the result, re- 
turned to the hall. He threw his arms about 
Curtis and, with deep emotion, exclaimed^ — ''God 
bless you, my boy ! You have saved the Repub- 
lican party. God bless you!" 

THE BALLOTING 

On the first ballot Seward received 173^, and 
Lincoln 102. The rest were scattering. On the 
second ballot Seward received 184J, and Lincoln 
181. Seward was still ahead, but Lincoln had 
made by far the greater gain. On the third bal- 
lot Seward received 180, and Lincoln 231^. But 
this ballot was not announced. The delegates 



1 82 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

kept tally during the progress of the vote. When 
it became evident that Lincoln was almost nomi- 
nated, while the feeling of expectancy was at the 
highest degree of tension, an Ohio delegate 
mounted his chair and announced a change of 
four Ohio votes from Chase to Lincoln. There 
was instantly a break. On every side delegates 
announced their change of votes to Lincoln. 
The result was evident to every one, and after 
a moment's pause, the crowd went mad with 
joy. 

REJOICINGS AT THE NEWS 

During all this time Lincoln remained at 
Springfield, where he was in telegraphic com- 
munication with his friends at Chicago, though 
not by private wire. At the time of his nomi- 
nation he had gone from his office to that of the 
Sangamon JournaL A messenger boy came 
rushing up to him, carrying a telegram and ex- 
claiming, "You are nominated!" The friends 
who were present joyously shook his hands and 
uttered their eager congratulations. Lincoln 
thanked them for their good wishes, and said : 
''There is a little woman on Eighth Street who 
will be glad to hear this, and I guess I'll go up 
and carry her the news." Pocketing the tele- 
gram, he walked home. 

At the wigwam, the news spread quickly. A 
man had been stationed on the roof as picket. 
He shouted, "Hallelujah! Abe Lincoln is nomi- 
nated. Fire the cannon !" The frenzy of joy 
spread to the immense throng of citizens outside 
the wigwam, then through the city, then through 
the State, then through the neighboring States. 
At Washington that night some one asked, "Who 



NOMINATION AND ELECTION 183 

is this man Lincoln, anyhow?" Douglas replied, 
*'There won't be a tar-barrel left in Illinois to- 
night." With unprecedented enthusiasm the 
Republican party started on this campaign, 
which led to its first victory in the election of 
Abraham Lincoln of Illinois, and Hannibal 
Hamlin of Maine. 



NO BARGAINS 

In his interesting book Six Months in the 
White House, F. B. Carpenter records the fol- 
lowing significant incident. 

''Among my visitors in the early part of May 
v^as the Hon, Mr. Alley, of Massachusetts, who 
gave me a deeply interesting inside glimpse of 
the Chicago Republican convention of i860. 
The popular current had, at first, set very 
strongly in favor of Mr. Seward, who, many 
supposed, would be nominated almost by accla- 
mation. The evening before the balloting the 
excitement was at the highest pitch. Mr. Lin- 
coln was telegraphed at Springfield, that his 
chances with the convention depended on ob- 
taining the votes of two delegations which were 
named in the despatch ; and that, to secure this 
support, he must pledge himself, if elected, to 
give places in his Cabinet to the respective heads 
of those delegations. A reply was immediately 
returned over the wires, characteristic of the 
man. It was to this effect: 

" 7 authorize no bargains and will he hound 

by none. . ^ . , , „ 

•^ A. Lmcoln.' " 



i84 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 



THE FORMAL NOTIFICATION 

After the nomination the committee of the 
convention duly called on Lincoln to give him 
the formal notification. This committee in- 
cluded some men already widely known, and 
still more so later. Among them were three 
from Massachusetts : George Ashmun, who pre- 
sided over the Chicago convention, Samuel 
Bowles, editor of the Springfield Republican, 
and George S. Boutwell. Other members of 
the committee were Gideon Welles, Carl Schurz, 
Francis P. Blair, and W. M. Evarts. The 
chairman of this committee notified Lincoln of 
his nomination in a brief speech, to which he 
responded with equal brevity. Even these few 
words impressed his hearers with a sense of 
dignity and manliness which they were only too 
glad to perceive. Said Mr. Boutwell : "Why, 
sir, they told me he was a rough diamond. 
Nothing could have been in better taste than 
that speech." 

One who had opposed Lincoln in the conven- 
tion said : *'We might have done a more daring 
thing [than nominate him], but we certainly 
could not have done a better thing." Carl 
Schurz evidently shared this feeling. 

COMPARATIVE ALTITUDES 

Judge Kelley of Pennsylvania was a very tall 
man and was proud of the fact. During the 
brief ceremony he and Lincoln had been meas- 
uring each other with the eye, and at its con- 
clusion the President elect demanded: 

"What's your height?" 



NOMINATION AND ELECTION 185 

"Six feet three. What is yours, Mr. Lin- 
coln?" 

''Six feet four." 

''Then," said the Judge, "Pennsylvania bows 
to Illinois. My dear man, for many years my 
heart has been aching for a President I could 
look up to, and I've found him at last in the 
land where we thought there were none but 
little giants," alluding to Douglas, popularly 
known as the "Little Giant." 

The general feeling of the committee was that 
the convention had made no mistake. This feel- 
ing quickly spread throughout the entire party. 
Some of Seward's friends wanted him to run on 
an independent ticket. It is to his credit that he 
scouted the idea. 

DIVIDED DEMOCRATS 

The Democrats, at least the opponents of Lin- 
coln, were divided into three camps. The first 
was the regular party, headed by Douglas. The 
second was the bolting party of fire-eaters, who 
nominated Breckinridge. The third was the 
party that nominated Bell and Everett. This 
was wittily called the Kangaroo ticket, because 
the tail was the most important part. Lincoln's 
popular vote at the November election was about 
forty per cent, of the total. It was plain that 
if his supporters held together and his oppo- 
nents were divided, he could readily get a plu- 
rality. There were attempts on the part of the 
opponents of Lincoln to run fusion tickets in 
New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania, so 
as to divert the electoral votes from him ; but 
these came to nothing more than that New 



1 86 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

Jersey diverted three of her seven electoral 
votes. 

A curious feature of the campaign was that 
all four candidates declared emphatically for the 
Union. Breckinridge, who was the candidate of 
the Southern disunionists, wrote: "The Consti- 
tution and the equality of the States, these are 
symbols of everlasting union." Lincoln himself 
could hardly have used stronger language. Some 
were doubtless deceived by these protestations, 
but not Douglas. He declared: *T do not be- 
lieve that every Breckinridge man is a dis- 
unionist, but I do believe that every disunionist 
in America is a Breckinridge man." 

AWAITING THE EVENT 

During the period of nearly six months be- 
tween nomination and election, Lincoln continued 
simple, patient, wise. He was gratified by the 
nomination. He was not elated, for he was not, 
in the ordinary sense, an ambitious man. He 
felt the burden of responsibility. He was a far- 
seeing statesman, and no man more distinctly 
realized the coming conflict. He felt the call 
of duty, not to triumph, but to sacrifice. 

There was no unnecessary change in his sim- 
ple manners and unpretentious mode of living. 
Friends and neighbors came, and he was glad to 
see them. He answered the door-bell himself and 
accompanied visitors to the door. Some of his 
friends, desiring to save his strength in these 
little matters, procured a negro valet, Thomas 
by name ; but Abraham continued to do most of 
the duties that by right belonged to Thomas. 

The campaign was one of great excitement. 



NOMINATION AND ELECTION 187 

Lincoln's letter of acceptance was of the briefest 
description and simply announced his adherence 
to the platform. For the rest, his previous utter- 
ances in the debates with Douglas, the Cooper 
Institute speech, and other addresses, were in 
print, and he was content to stand by the record. 
He showed his wisdom in refusing to be di- 
verted, or to allow his party to be diverted, from 
the one important question of preventing the fur- 
ther extension of slavery. The public were not 
permitted to lose sight of the fact that this was 
the real issue. 

THE MOMENTOUS ELECTION 

The election occurred on the sixth day of No- 
vember. Lincoln received 1,866,452 popular 
votes, and one hundred and eighty electoral votes. 
Douglas received 1,375,157 popular votes, and 
twelve electoral votes. Breckinridge received 
847,953 popular votes, and seventy-two electoral 
votes. Bell received 590,631 popular votes, and 
thirty-nine electoral votes. 

Lincoln carried all the free States, except that 
in New Jersey the electoral vote was divided, he 
receiving four out of seven. In the fifteen slave 
States he received no electoral vote. In ten 
States not one person had voted for him. 

Of the 303 electoral votes he had received 180, 
while the aggregate of all against him numbered 
123, giving him an absolute majority of 57. The 
electoral vote was duly counted in the joint ses- 
sion of the two Houses of Congress February 
13, 1 86 1, and it was officially announced that 
Abraham Lincoln, having received a majority of 
the votes of the Presidential electors, was duly 



1 88 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

elected President of the United States for four 
years, beginning March 4, 1861. 

"mary, mary! we are elected!" 

On the day of the election, Lincoln said he was 
calm and sure of the result. The first news he 
received, mostly from New York, was unfavor- 
able, and he felt a little discouraged. Later the 
despatches indicated a turn in the tide, and when 
he learned of his election he said his heart over- 
flowed with thanksgiving to God for his provi- 
dential goodness to our beloved country. He 
continued : 

"I cannot conceal the fact that I was a very 
happy man," and he added, with much feeling, 
''who could help being so under such circum- 
stances?" He then said that "the enthusiastic 
greetings of his neighbors and friends during the 
evening, at the Club," together with the numer- 
ous telegrams which poured in upon him, "well- 
nigh upset him with joy." 

At a late hour he left the club-rooms and went 
home to talk over matters with his wife. Before 
going to the Club that evening to get the election 
news as it came in, he said : 

"I told my wife to go to bed, as probably I 
should not be back before midnight. When at 
about twelve o'clock the news came informing 
me of my election, I said: 'Boys, I think I will go 
home now : for there is a little woman there who 
would like to hear the news.' The Club gave me 
three rousing cheers, and then I left. On my 
arrival I went to my bedroom and found my 
wife sound asleep. I gently touched her shoul- 
der and said 'Mary'; she made no answer. I 



NOMINATION AND ELECTION 189 

spoke again, a little louder, saying, 'Mary, Mary ! 
ive are elected!' Well, ... I then went to bed, 
but before I went to sleep I selected every mem- 
ber of my Cabinet, save one. I determined on 
Seward for my Secretary of State, Chase for 
Secretary of the Treasury, Welles, whose ac- 
quaintance I made in Hartford, for Secretary of 
the Navy, and Blair and others for the other 
positions. . . . My Cabinet was substantially 
fixed upon that night. I wanted Seward, for I 
had the highest respect for him, and the utmost 
confidence in his ability. I wanted Chase, also ; 
I considered him one of the ablest, best, and most 
reliable men in the country, and a good repre- 
sentative of the progressive, anti-slavery element 
of the party." 

In a word, he said he "wanted all his com- 
petitors to have a place in his Cabinet in order 
to create harmony in the party." 



CHAPTER XVII 
The President Elect 

The election over, Lincoln was sorely be- 
set by office-seekers. Individuals, deputations, 
''delegations," from all quarters, pressed in upon 
him in a manner that might have killed a man 
of less robust constitution. The hotels of Spring- 
field were filled with gentlemen who came with 
light baggage and heavy schemes. The party 
had never been in office : a ''clean sweep" of the 
*'ins" was expected ; and all the "outs" were 
patriotically anxious to take the vacant places. 
It was a party that had never fed; and it was 
voraciously hungry. Lincoln and Artemus Ward 
saw a great deal of fun in it; and in all human 
probability it was the fun alone that enabled 
Lincoln to bear it. 

Judge Davis said that Lincoln had determined 
to appoint "Democrats and Republicans alike to 
office." Many things confirm this statement. 
Lincoln felt deeply the responsibility of his great 
trust; and he felt still more keenly the supposed 
impossibility of administering the Government 
for the sole benefit of an organization which had 
no existence in one-half of the Union. He was 
therefore willing not only to appoint Democrats 
to office, but to appoint them to the very highest 
offices within his gift. At this time he thought 
very highly of Alexander H. Stephens of 
Georgia, and would gladly have taken him into 
190 



THE PRESIDENT ELECT 191 

his Cabinet but for the fear that Georgia might 
secede, and take Stephens along with her. 

VISITS OLD FRIENDS AND RELATIONS 

After his election, Lincoln began to think very 
tenderly of his friends and relatives in Coles 
County, especially of his good stepmother and 
her daughters. By the first of February, he con- 
cluded that he could not leave his home to as- 
sume the vast responsibilities that awaited him 
without paying them a visit. Accordingly, he 
left Springfield on the first day of that month, 
and went straight to Charleston, where Colonel 
Chapman and his family resided. He was ac- 
companied by Mr. Marshall, the State Senator 
from that district, and was entertained at his 
house. The people crowded to see him ; and he 
was serenaded by ''both the string and brass 
bands of the town, but declined making a speech." 
Early the next morning, he repaired "to his 
cousin, Dennis Hanks" ; and the jolly Dennis had 
the satisfaction of seeing a grand levee under his 
own roof. 

It was all very pleasant to Lincoln to see such 
multitudes of familiar faces smiling upon his 
wonderful successes. But the chief object of his 
solicitude was not here. Mrs. Lincoln, his step- 
mother, lived in the southern part of the county, 
and he was all impatience to see her. As soon, 
therefore, as he had taken a frugal breakfast 
with Dennis, he and Colonel Chapman started 
off in a "two-horse buggy" toward Farmington, 
where the stepmother was living with her daugh- 
ter, Mrs. Moore. They had much difficulty in 
crossing the Kickapoo River, which was running 



192 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

full of ice ; but they finally made the dangerous 
passage, and arrived at Farmington in safety. 
The meeting between him and the old lady was 
of a most affectionate and tender character. She 
fondled him as her own ''Abe," and he her as 
his own mother. It was soon arranged that she 
should return with him to Charleston, so that 
they might enjoy by the way the unrestricted and 
uninterrupted intercourse which they both de- 
sired above all things, but which they were not 
likely to have where the people could get at him. 
Then Lincoln and Colonel Chapman drove to the 
house of John Hall, who lived ''on the old Lin- 
coln farm," where Abe split the celebrated rails, 
and fenced in the little clearing in 1830. Thence 
they went to the spot where old Tom Lincoln was 
buried. The grave was unmarked and utterly 
neglected. Abraham said he wanted to "have it 
enclosed, and a suitable tombstone erected." He 
told Colonel Chapman to go to a marble-dealer, 
ascertain the cost of the work proposed, and 
write him in full. He would then send Dennis 
Hanks the money, and an inscription for the 
stone ; and Dennis would do the rest. 

MOTHER AND SON 

The parting between Lincoln and his mother 
was very touching. She embraced him with deep 
emotion, and said she was sure she would never 
behold him again, for she felt that his enemies 
would assassinate him. He replied, "No, no, 
mamma: they will not do that. Trust in the 
Lord, and all will be well : we will see each other 
again." Inexpressibly affected by this new evi- 
dence of her tender attachment and deep concern 



THE PRESIDENT ELECT 193 

for his safety, he gradually and reluctantly with- 
drew himself from the arms of the woman who 
had been as devoted to him as his own mother 
before her, and he departed feeling still more 
oppressed by the heavy cares which time and 
events were rapidly augmenting. 

The fear that Lincoln would be assassinated 
was not peculiar to his stepmother. It was 
shared by very many of his neighbors at Spring- 
held ; and the friendly warnings he received were 
as numerous as they were silly and gratuitous. 

FOUR MONTHS OF ANXIETY 

Four months would not ordinarily be consid- 
ered a long period of time. But when one is 
compelled to see the working of a vast amount 
of mischief, powerless to prevent it, and know- 
ing one's self to be the chief victim of it all, the 
time is long. Such was the fate of Lincoln. 
The election was not the end of a life of toil and 
struggle, it was the beginning of a new career of 
sorrow. The period of four months between the 
election and the inauguration could not be de- 
voted to rest or to the pleasant plans for a pros- 
perous term of service. A scheme was develop- 
ing for the disruption of the Government. The 
excuse was Lincoln's election. But he was for 
four months only a private citizen. He had no 
power. He could only watch the growing mis- 
chief and realize that he was the ultimate victim. 



BUCHANAN AND HIS BOURBON CABINET 

Buchanan, who was then President, had a 
genius for doing the most unwise thing. He was 



194 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

a Northern man with Southern principles, and 
this may have unfitted him to see things in their 
true relations. He certainly was putty in the 
hands of those who wished to destroy the Union, 
and his vacillation precisely accomplished what 
they wished. 

President Buchanan sent in his annual mes- 
sage to Congress December 3, i860. In his dis- 
cussion of the subject of slavery, he recom- 
mended that it be extended to the Territories — 
the very thing that the people had just voted 
should not be done. Concerning secession, he 
said in substance that the Government had the 
power to suppress revolt, but that it could not 
use that power in reference to South Carolina, 
the State then under consideration. The seces- 
sionists had apparently tied the hands of the 
executive effectually. 

Now observe what was going on in the Cabi- 
net. Lewis Cass had been Secretary of State, 
but resigned in indignation over the inaction of 
the President when he failed to succor the forts 
in Charleston (S. C.) harbor. He was succeeded 
by Jeremiah S. Black, who, as Attorney-General, 
had given to Buchanan an opinion that the Fed- 
eral Government had no power to coerce a seced- 
ing State. 

Howell Cobb, Secretary of the Treasury, hav- 
ing wasted the funds and destroyed the credit 
of the Government, resigned and left an empty 
treasury. 

John B. Floyd, Secretary of War, was not the 
least active. He carried out fully the plan which 
Jefferson Davis had begun to operate several 
years before. Northern arsenals were stripped 
of arms and ammunition, which were sent to the 



THE PRESIDENT ELECT 195 

South for storage or use. The number of regu- 
lar troops was small, but the few soldiers there 
were, he scattered in distant places, so that they 
should be out of reach. They were not to be 
available for the use of the Government until the 
conspirators should have time to complete their 
work. 

Not worse, perhaps, but more flagrant, was the 
action of the Secretary of the Interior, Thomp- 
son of Mississippi. With the advice and consent 
of Buchanan, he left his post at Washington to 
visit North Carolina and help on the work of 
secession, and then returned and resumed his 
official prerogatives under the Government he 
had sworn to sustain. 

Meanwhile Isaac Toucey, Secretary of the 
Navy, had been prevailed on to put the navy 
out of reach. The armed vessels were sent to 
the ends of the earth. At the first critical period 
only two were available to the Government. 

WHAT WAS GOING ON IN CONGRESS 

Congress was very busy doing nothing. Both 
Senate and House raised committees for the pur- 
pose of devising means of compromise. But 
every measure of concession was promptly voted 
down by the body that had appointed the com- 
mittees. In the Senate the slave power was in 
full control. In the House the slave power was 
not in majority, but its servants enjoyed the ad- 
vantage of being able to work together, while 
the Representatives of the free States were usu- 
ally divided among themselves. 

On January 7, 1861, Senator Yulee, of Florida, 
wrote: "By remaining in our places until the 4th 



196 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

of March, it is thought we can keep the hands 
of Mr. Buchanan tied, and disable the RepubH- 
cans from effecting any legislation which will 
strengthen the hands of the incoming Adminis- 
tration." 

On December 14, i860, thirty of the Southern 
Senators and Representatives had issued a cir- 
cular to their constituents. They said that argu- 
ment was exhausted, that all hope of relief was 
extinguished, that the Republicans would grant 
nothing satisfactory, and that the honor, safety, 
and independence of the Southern people re- 
quired the organization of a Southern Confed- 
eracy. 

South Carolina was the first to act. Six days 
later that State passed the ordinance of seces- 
sion. 

Upon this, one of the extreme delinquents was 
forced out of the Cabinet. Floyd, the Secretary 
of War, was displaced by Holt, a loyal man. 
Floyd, however, had done nearly all the mischief 
he could have done. Stanton had already re- 
placed Black as Attorney-General. 

The conspirators then held a caucus. It is 
supposed that this caucus was held in one of the 
rooms of the Capitol. At all events it was held 
in the city of Washington. It was composed of 
the extreme Southern Congressmen. It decided 
to recommend immediate secession, the forma- 
tion of the Southern Confederacy, and, not least, 
that the Congressmen should remain in their 
seats to keep the President's hands tied. The 
committee to carry out these plans consisted of 
Jefferson Davis, Slidell, and Mallory. By the 
first day of February, seven States had passed 
ordinances of secession. 



THE PRESIDENT ELECT 197 



LINCOLN S PREDICAMENT 

All this preparation for dissolving the Union 
was going on during the four months Lincoln 
was waiting for the appointed time when he 
should enter upon his Presidential duties. Im- 
agine a man looking upon a house he was shortly 
to occupy, and seeing vandals applying the torch 
and ax of destruction, while he was not per- 
mitted to go to the rescue, all the while knowing 
that he would be held accountable for the preser- 
vation of the building. So the helpless Lincoln 
saw this work of destruction going on at Wash- 
ington. It was plain that the mischief ought to 
be, and could be, stopped. But Buchanan would 
not stop it, and till March 4 Lincoln, we repeat, 
was a private citizen and could do nothing for 
its prevention. 



CHAPTER XVIII 
Journey to Washington and Inauguration 

On February ii, 1861, the arrangements for 
Lincoln's departure from Springfield were com- 
pleted. It was intended to occupy the time re- 
maining between that date and March 4 with a 
grand tour from State to State and city to city. 

Having reached the train made ready for him, 
Lincoln ascended the rear platform, and, facing 
about to the throng which had closed around 
him, drew himself up to his full height, removed 
his hat, and stood for several seconds in pro- 
found silence. 

To those who were anxiously waiting to catch 
words 'upon which the fate of the nation might 
hang, it seemed long until he had mastered his 
feelings sufficiently to speak. At length he began 
in a husky tone of voice, and slowly and impres- 
sively delivered his farewell to his neighbors. 
Imitating his example, every man in the crowd 
stood with his head uncovered in the fast-falling 
rain. 

"Friends : No one who has never been placed 
in a like position can understand my feelings at 
this hour, nor the oppressive sadness I feel at this 
parting. For more than a quarter of a century 
I have lived among you, and during all that time 
I have received nothing but kindness at your 
hands. Here I have lived from my youth, until 
now I am an old man. Here the most sacred 
ties of earth were assumed. Here all my chil- 



JOURNEY AND INAUGURATION 199 

dren were born ; and here one of them Hes bur- 
ied. To you, dear friends, I owe all that I have, 
all that I am. All the strange, checkered past 
seems to crozvd noiv upon my mind. To-day I 
leave you. I go to assume a task more difficult 
than that which devolved upon Washington. 
Unless the great God, who assisted him, shall be 
with and aid me, I must fail ; but if the same 
omniscient mind and almighty arm that directed 
and protected him shall guide and support me, 
I shall not fail — I shall succeed. Let us all pray 
that the God of our fathers may not forsake us 
now. To him I commend you all. Permit me 
to ask that, with equal security and faith, you 
will invoke his wisdom and guidance for me. 
With these few words I must leave you : for how 
long I know not. Friends, one and all, I must 
now bid you an affectionate farewell." 

" It was a most impressive scene," said a local 
newspaper. *'We have known Mr. Lincoln for 
many years ; we have heard him speak upon a 
hundred different occasions ; but we never saw 
him so profoundly affected, nor did he ever utter 
an address which seemed to us so full of simple 
and and touching eloquence, so exactly adapted 
to the occasion, so worthy of the man and the 
hour." 

The party was in charge of Colonel Ward H. 
Lamon, afterward Marshal of the District of 
Columbia. He was a trained athlete, a Hercules 
in strength, a man who knew not what fear was, 
and, with an enthusiasm akin to religious zeal, 
he was devoted to his chief soul and body. 



ABRAHAM LINCOLN 



SPEECHES ON THE WAY 



During the memorable journey Lincoln made 
many brief speeches. These were closely scanned 
in the hope of finding some intimation of his 
inaugural. But not one such word escaped him. 
He declared that though he had in his day done 
much hard work, this was the hardest work he 
had ever done — to keep speaking without saying 
anything. It was not quite true that he did not 
say anything, for the speeches were thoughtful 
and full of interest. But he did not anticipate 
his inaugural, and to that the popular curiosity 
was alive. He did not say the things that were 
uppermost in his mind. 

At Trenton, N. J., historic in the annals of the 
Revolutionary War, he spoke with simple candor 
of the influence upon his own life of Weems's 
Life of Washington, one of the first books he 
ever read. The aiidience broke into cheers, loud 
and long, when he appealed to them to stand by 
him in the discharge of his patriotic duty. "I 
shall endeavor," said he, *'to take the ground I 
deem most just to the North, the East, the West, 
the South, and the whole country. I take it, I 
hope, in good temper ; certainly with no malice 
toward any section. I shall do all that may be 
in my power to promote a peaceful settlement of 
all our difiiculties. The man does not live who 
is more devoted to peace than I am, none who 
would do more to preserve it; but it may be 
necessary to put the foot down firmly. And if I 
do my duty and do right, you will sustain me, 
will you not?" 



JOURNEY AND INAUGURATION 



ASSASSINATION PLOT 

At Philadelphia matters became more ex- 
citing. There Lincoln's friends were informed 
of a plot to assassinate him as he passed through 
Baltimore. This information came to them from 
a variety of sources entirely independent, and the 
various stories so nearly agreed in substance that 
they could not be disregarded. Most important 
of the informants was Allan Pinkerton of Chi- 
cago, one of the most famous detectives in the 
world. He had been personally with his assist- 
ants in Baltimore and knew the details of the 
plot. But Lincoln was neither suspicious nor 
timid, and was therefore disinclined to pay heed 
to the warnings of Pinkerton. 

But the members of the party were deeply 
concerned about the Baltimore revelations. It 
was hard to get Lincoln to take them seriously. 
With difficulty was he persuaded to follow Pin- 
kerton's plan and enter Washington secretly. 
He consented to do this only out of considera- 
tion for the judgment of others. On one thing, 
however, Lincoln was firm. He had made cer- 
tain appointments for speaking en route which 
he would not abandon. His promise had been 
given and would be kept. "These appointments," 
said he, 'T will keep if it costs me my life." 
These words suggest that he may have realized 
the danger more than he was willing to show. 

THE LOST ''certificate" 

An incident occurred at Harrisburg which 
made a great stir in the little party. This was 
nothing less than the loss of the manuscript of 



202 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

the inaugural address. This precious document 
Lincohi himself had carried in a satchel. This 
satchel he had given to his son Robert to hold. 
When Robert was asked for it, it was missing. 
He ''thought he had given it to a waiter — or 
somebody." This was one of the rare occasions 
on which Lincoln lost control of his temper, 
and for about one minute he addressed the 
careless young man with great plainness of 
speech. 

A little later the satchel was found, and it 
was not again entrusted to Robert. His father 
kept it in his own hands. After the nervous 
strain was over, the humor of the situation grew 
on Lincoln and reminded him of a little story, 
which he told in substance as follows. 

A man had saved up his earnings until they 
reached the sum of fifteen hundred dollars. This 
was deposited for safe-keeping in a bank. The 
bank failed and the man received as his share ten 
per cent, or one hundred and fifty dollars. This 
he deposited in another bank. The second bank 
also failed and the poor fellow again received ten 
per cent, or fifteen dollars. When this remnant 
of his fortune was paid over to him, he held it 
in his hand, looking at it thoughtfully. Finally 
he said : "Now, I've got you reduced to a port- 
able shape, so I'll put you in my pocket." Suit- 
ing the action to the word, Lincoln took from the 
satchel his ''certificate of moral character, writ- 
ten by himself," as he described it, and carefully 
put it in the inside pocket of his vest. No fur- 
ther mishap came to that document. 

It is positively asserted by Lamon, who knew 
whereof he spoke, that there was no time, from 
the moment of leaving Springfield to his death, 



JOURNEY AND INAUGURATION 203 

when Lincoln was free from danger of murder. 
Yet he never could be prevailed on to accept pre- 
cautions. 

PREJUDICE DISARMED 

As an illustration of the prejudice against Lin- 
coln at the South, the following incident is re- 
lated by one of his biographers, Isaac N. Arnold. 
Two or three days before the inauguration on 
March 4, 1861, and while Abraham Lincoln was 
staying at Willard's Hotel, a distinguished South 
Carolina lady — one of the Howards^ — the widow 
of a Northern scholar — called upon him out of 
curiosity. She was very proud, aristocratic, and 
quite conscious that she had in' her veins the 
blood of ''all the Hozvards,'' and she was curious 
to see a man who had been represented to her 
as a monster, a mixture of the ape and the tiger. 

She was shown into the parlor where were 
Mr. Lincoln, and Senators Seward, Hale, Chase, 
and other prominent members of Congress. As 
Mr. Seward, whom she knew, presented her to 
the President elect, she hissed in his ear: "I am 
a South Carolinian." Instantly reading her char- 
acter, he turned and addressed her with the 
greatest courtesy, and dignified and gentlemanly 
politeness. After listening a few moments, as- 
tonished to find him so different from what he 
had been described to her, she said : 

"Why, Mr. Lincoln, you look, act, and speak 
like a kind, good-hearted, generous man." 

"And did you expect to meet a savage?" 
said he. 

"Certainly I did, or even something worse," 
replied she. "I am glad I have met you," she 
continued, "and now the best way to preserve 



204 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

peace, is for you to go to Charleston, and show 
the people what you are, and tell them you have 
no intention of injuring them." 

Returning home, she found a party of seces- 
sionists, and on entering the room she exclaimed : 

"I have seen him! I have seen him!" 

''Who?" they inquired. 

''That terrible monster, Lincoln, and I found 
him a gentleman, and I am going to his first 
levee after his inauguration." 

PRE-INAUGURAL INCIDENTS 

When he reached Washington, every official 
courtesy was ^lown to the President elect. The 
outgoing President and Cabinet received him 
politely. He had many supporters and some per- 
sonal friends in both Houses of Congress. These 
received him with enthusiasm, while his oppo- 
nents were not uncivil. The members of the 
Supreme Court greeted him with a measure of 
cordiality. Both Douglas and Breckinridge, the 
defeated candidates at the late election, called 
on him. The so-called Peace Conference had 
brought together many men of local influence, 
who seized the opportunity of making his ac- 
quaintance. So the few days passed busily as 
the time for inauguration approached. 

Of course anxiety and even excitement were 
not unknown. One instance is enough to relate 
here. Arrangements were about concluded for 
the Cabinet appointments. The most important 
selection was for the Secretary of State. This 
position had been tendered to Seward months 
before and had by him been accepted. The sub- 
sequent selections had been made in view of the 



JOURNEY AND INAUGURATION 205 

fact that* Seward was to fill this position. On 
Saturday, March 2, while only a few hours re- 
mained before the inauguration, Seward sud- 
denly withdrew his promised acceptance. This 
utterly upset the balancings on which Lincoln 
had so carefully worked for the last four months, 
and was fitted to cause consternation. Lincoln's 
comment was : "I can't afford to have Seward 
take the first trick." So he sent him an urgent 
personal note on the morning of March 4, re- 
questing him to withdraw this refusal. Seward 
acceded to this and the matter was arranged 
satisfactorily. 

INAUGURAL CEREMONIES 

The inauguration day had arrived, and at noon 
on that day the Administration of James Bu- 
chanan was to come to a close, and that of Abra- 
ham Lincoln was to take its place. 

The morning opened pleasantly. At an early 
hour he gave his inaugural address its final revi- 
sion. Extensive preparations had been made to 
render the occasion as impressive as possible. 
By nine o'clock the procession had begun to 
form, and at eleven o'clock it commenced to 
move toward Willard's Hotel, where Lincoln had 
rooms. President Buchanan remained for a 
while at the Capitol, signing bills. At half-past 
twelve he called for Mr. Lincoln ; and, after a 
delay of a few moments, both descended, and 
entered the open barouche in waiting for them. 
Shortly after, the procession took up its line of 
march for the Capitol. 

The Senate remained in session till twelve 
o'clock, when Mr. Breckinridge, in a few well- 



2o6 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

chosen words, bade the Senators farewell, and 
then conducted his successor, Mr. Hamlin, to the 
chair. At this moment, members and members 
elect of the House of Representatives, and the 
Diplomatic Corps, entered the chamber. At 
thirteen minutes to one, the Judges of the Su- 
preme Court were announced ; and on their 
entrance, headed by the venerable Chief Justice 
Taney, all on the floor arose, while they moved 
slowly to the seats assigned them at the right 
of the Vice-President, bowing to that officer as 
they passed. At fifteen minutes past one, the 
Marshal-in-chief entered the chamber, ushering 
in the President and President elect. Mr. Lin- 
coln looked pale, and wan, and anxious. In a 
few moments, the Marshal led the way to the 
platform at the eastern portico of the Capitol, 
where preparations had been made for the in- 
auguration ceremony ; and he was followed by 
the Judges of the Supreme Court, Sergeant-at- 
Arms of the Senate, the Committee of Arrange- 
ments, the President and President elect, Vice- 
President, Secretary of the Senate, Senators, 
Diplomatic Corps, Heads of Departments, and 
others in the chamber. 

On arriving at the platform, Mr. Lincoln was 
introduced to the assembly, by the Hon. E. D. 
Baker, United States Senator from Oregon. 
Stepping forward, in a manner deliberate and 
impressive, he read in a clear, penetrating voice, 
his inaugural address, which will be found in 
another volume of this series. 

The address was listened to closely through- 
out. Immediately upon its conclusion the speak- 
er was sworn into office by Chief Justice Taney, 
whose name is connected with the famous Dred 



JOURNEY AND INAUGURATION 207 

Scott decision. James Buchanan was now a 
private citizen and the pioneer rail-spHtter was 
at the head of the United States. 

LOYALTY OF DOUGLAS : HIS DEATH 

In all the thousands of people there assembled, 
there was no one who listened more intently 
than Stephen A. Douglas. At the conclusion he 
warmly grasped the President's hands, con- 
gratulated him upon the inaugural, and pledged 
him that he would stand by him and support him 
in upholding the Constitution and enforcing the 
laws. The clearness, the gentleness, the mag- 
nanimity, the manliness expressed in this inaugu- 
ral address of his old rival, won him over at 
last, and he pledged him here his fealty. For a 
few months,, while the storm was brewing, 
Douglas was inactive, so that his influence 
counted on the side of the hostile party, the 
party to which he had always belonged. But 
when war actually broke out, he hastened to 
stand by the President, and right nobly did he 
redeem the promise he had given. Had he lived, 
there are few men whose influence would have 
been more weighty in the Union cause. An un- 
timely death cut him off at the beginning of this 
patriotic activity. His last public act was to 
address to the Legislature of Illinois a masterly 
plea for the support of the war for the Union. 
He died in Chicago, June 3, 1861. 



CHAPTER XIX 
The President and His Cabinet 

The selection of a Cabinet was a difficult and 
delicate task. It must be remembered that Lin- 
coln confronted a solid South, backed by a di- 
vided North. In fifteen States he had received 
not a single electoral vote, and in ten of these 
not a single popular vote. That was the splid 
South. 

It is plain that unless Lincoln could, in a large 
measure, unite the various classes of the North, 
his utter failure would be a foregone conclusion. 
He saw this with perfect clearness. His first 
move was in the selection of his Cabinet. Its 
members were taken not only from the various 
geographical divisions of the country, but also 
from the divers political divisions of his party. 
It was his purpose to have the secretaries not 
simply echoes of himself, but able and repre- 
sentative men of various types of political opin- 
ion. At the outset this did not meet the ap- 
proval of his friends. Later, its wisdom was 
apparent. 

The names submitted to the Senate on March 
5 were: for Secretary of State, William H. 
Seward of New York; for Secretary of the 
Treasury, Salmon P. Chase of Ohio; for Secre- 
tary of War, Simon Cameron of Pennsylvania ; 
for Secretary of the Navy, Gideon Welles of 
Connecticut ; for Secretary of the Interior, Caleb 
B. Smith of Indiana ; for Attorney-General, Ed- 



THE PRESIDENT AND HIS CABINET 209 

ward Bates of Missouri; for Postmaster-Gen- 
eral, Montgomery Blair of Maryland. 

All these names were confirmed by the Senate 
the next day. Of the variety of the selection, 
Lincoln said, "I need them all. They enjoy the 
confidence of their several States and sections, 
and they will strengthen the Administration. 
The times are too grave and perilous for ambi- 
tious schemes and rivalries." To all who were 
associated with him in the Government, he said, 
"Let us forget ourselves, and join hands, like 
brothers, to save the Republic. If we succeed, 
there will be glory enough for all." He play- 
fully spoke of this Cabinet as his happy family. 

The only one who withdrew early from this 
number was Cameron. He was accused of vari- 
ous forms of corruption, especially of giving fat 
government contracts to his friends. Whether 
these charges were true or not, we cannot say. 
But in the following January he resigned and 
was succeeded by Edwin M. Stanton, a lifelong 
Democrat, one who had accepted office under 
Buchanan. Probably no person was more amazed 
at this choice than Stanton himself. But he 
patriotically accepted the call of duty. With 
unspeakable loyalty and devotion he served his 
chief and his country to the end. 

seward's presumption 

The President's first encounter of authority 
with a member of his Cabinet was brought on 
by Secretary Seward. The incident is here given 
in the words of the distinguished editor and 
publicist, Henry Watterson. 

The men Lincoln had invited to become mem- 



2IO ABRAHAM LIXCOLN 

bers of his political family each thought himself 
greater than his chief. They should have heard 
the voice and seen the hand of a man born to 
command. From the day Abraham Lincoln en- 
tered the White House to the hour he went 
thence to his death, there was not a moment 
when he did not control the situation and all his 
official dependents. 

!Mr. Seward was the first to yield to his own 
presumption. One of the most extraordinary in- 
cidents that ever passed between a ruler and his 
subordinate came about within thirty days after 
the beginning of the new Administration. 

On April i Mr. Seward submitted to ]\Ir. Lin- 
coln a memorandum, entitled "Some Thoughts 
for the President's Consideration." He began 
this by saying: '*^^'e are at the end of a month's 
administration, and yet without a policy either 
domestic or foreign." Then follows a series of 
remarkable suggestions. They are for the most 
part flimsy and irrelevant; but two of them are 
so ridiculous that I quote them as specimens. 
Mr. Seward writes as follows: 

''We must change the question before the 
public from one upon slavery, or about slavery, 
to one upon union or disunion, and I would 
demand explanations from Spain and France, 
energetically, at once, . . . and, if satisfactory 
explanations are not received from Spain and 
France, I would convene Congress and declare 
war against them. ... I would seek explana- 
tions from Great Britain and Russia, and send 
agents into Canada, Mexico, and Central Ameri- 
ca to arouse a vigorous spirit of continental in- 
dependence on this continent against European 
intervention." 



THE PRESIDENT AND HIS CABINET air 

Indeed ! At the very moment this advice was 
seriously given the President by the Secretary of 
State the Southern Confederacy had been estab- 
lished, and Europe was most keen for a pretext 
to interfere to effect the dissolution of the Union 
and defeat the republican form of government 
in America. The Government of the United 
States had only to menace France and Spain, to 
wink its eye at England and Russia, to raise up a 
four-sided alliance of monarchy against democ- 
racy and bring down upon itself the navies of 
Europe, and thus assure and confirm the Gov- 
ernment of the Southern Confederacy. 

In closing his astonishing advice, Mr. Seward 
adds : "But whatever policy we adopt, there must 
be an energetic prosecution of it. For this pur- 
pose it must be somebody's business to pi.irsue 
and direct it incessantly. Either the President 
must do it himself and be all the while active in 
it, or devolve it on some member of his Cabinet. 
Once adopted, all debates on it must end, and 
all agree and abide. It is not in my special prov- 
ince ; but I neither seek to evade nor assume 
responsibility." 

If Mr. Seward had blandly said : " Mr. Lin- 
coln, you are a failure as President; just turn 
over the management of affairs to me, and the 
rest shall be forgiven," he could hardly have 
spoken more offensively. 

HOW THE PRESIDENT ANSWERED SEWARD 

Now let us see how a great man carries him- 
self at a critical moment under extreme provoca- 
tion. Here is the answer Mr. Lincoln sent Mr. 
Seward that very night : 



2 12 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

"Executive Mansion, April i, 1861. 

"Hon. W. H. Seward: 

"My dear Sir: Since parting with you I have 
been considering your paper dated this day and 
entitled 'Some Thoughts for the President's 
Consideration.' The first proposition in it is, 'we 
are at the end of a month's administration and 
yet without a policy, either domestic or foreign.' 

"At the beginning of that month, in the In- 
augural, I said : 'The power confided to me will 
be used to hold, occupy, and possess the proj>- 
erty and places belonging to the Goveniment, 
and to collect the duties and imposts.' This had 
3^our distinct approval at the time ; and taken in 
connection with the order I immediately gave 
General Scott, directing him to employ every 
means in his power to strengthen and hold the 
forts, comprises the exact domestic policy you 
urge, with the single exception that it does not 
propose to abandon Fort Sumter. . . . 

"Upon your closing propositions that 'what- 
ever policy we adopt, there must be an energetic 
prosecution of it' ; . . . 'It must be somebody's 
business' ; . . . 'Either the President must do it 
... or devolve it upon some member of his 
Cabinet' ; 'Once adopted, debates must end, and 
all agree and abide' ; I remark that if this be 
done I must do it. When a general line of pol- 
icy is adopted, I apprehend there is no danger of 
its being changed without good reason, or con- 
tinuing to be a subject of unnecessary debate; 
still, upon points arising in its progress, I wish, 
and suppose I am entitled to have, the advice of 
all the Cabinet. 

"Your obedient servant, A. Lincoln." 



THE PRESIDENT AND HIS CABINET 213 

Nicolay and Hay state that in this letter not 
a word was omitted that was necessary, atnd 
there is not an allusion in it that could be dis- 
pensed with. It concluded the argument. Mr. 
Lincoln never mentioned it. From that time on 
the understanding between them was cordial 
and agreeable. About eight weeks later, on May 
21, Mr. Seward placed before the President the 
draft of a letter of instructions to Charles Fran- 
cis Adams, United States Minister to Eno:land. 
Mr. Lincoln did not scruple to change its char- 
acter and purpose by altering the text. ... It is 
well understood that if that letter had gone as 
Mr. Seward wrote it, a war with England would 
have been inevitable. . . . Even in the substitu- 
tion of one word for another, Mr. Lincoln 
evinced a grasp both upon the situation and the 
language, of which Mr. Seward, with all his 
experience and learning, appears to have been 
oblivious. It is said that in considering this 
document, sitting with his head bowed and pen- 
cil in hand, Mr. Lincoln was heard to repeat 
softly to himself: ''One war at a time — one war 
at a time." 

So far as is known, neither Lincoln nor Sew- 
ard ever made any reference to this correspon- 
dence. The result was worth while. It bound 
Seward to his President with hoops of steel. 
For four long, weary, trying years he served his 
chief with a loyal devotion which did credit to 
both men. The hallucination that he was pre- 
mier was forever dispelled from Seward's mind. 
A public observer wrote : ''There can be no 
doubt of it any longer. This man from Illinois 
is not in the hands of Mr. Seward." 



2 14 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 



, THE MASTER MIND OF THE CABINET 

Says Titian J. Coffey, in his Reminiscences of 
Abraham Lincoln: I often heard the Attorney- 
General (Bates) say on his return from impor- 
tant Cabinet meetings that the more he saw of 
Mr. Lincoln the more he was impressed with the 
clearness and vigor of his intellect and the 
breadth and sagacity of his views, and he would 
add: "He is beyond question the master mind of 
the Cabinet." 

No man could talk with him on public ques- 
tions without being struck with the singular lu- 
cidity of his mind and the rapidity with which 
he seized upon the essential point. 

"stanton's nearly always right !" 

Some of Lincoln's biographers are enthusias- 
tic admirers of Stanton, who seems never, until 
the close of the war^ to have entertained cordial 
feelings toward the President. On some occa- 
sions Lincoln's patience with the Secretary of 
War is rather astonishing than admirable. A 
committee, headed by Mr. Love joy, brought the 
Secretary an important order of the President's 
and met with a flat refusal tO' obey : 

**But we have the President's order," said 
Love joy. 

"Did Lincoln give you an order of that kind ?" 
Slid Stanton. 

'|He did, sir." 

"Then he is a blanked fool," said the irate 
Secretary. 

The conversation was immediately reported to 
the President. 



THE PRESIDENT AND HIS CABINET 215 

"Did he say I was a blanked fool?" asked the 
President, at the close of the recital. 

"He did, sir, and repeated it." 

After a moment's pause, and looking up, the 
President said : 

"If Stanton said I was a blanked fool, then I 
must be one, for he is nearly always right, and 
generally says wh^t he means. I will step over 
and see him." 

The President probably wished to conceal 
from strangers, at some sacrifice of personal dig- 
nity, the possibility of divisions in the Cabinet. 

THE PRESIDENT COMPARES HIMSELF TO BLONDIN 

When dififerences in the Cabinet became dan- 
gerous enough to threaten its dissolution, Lin- 
coln ceased to call his constitutional advisers 
together, and for over a year they had no formal 
Cabinet session. Twenty United States Sena- 
tors called upon him in a body, intent on com- 
plaining of Stanton's conduct of the war. The 
President's sense of humor did not desert him, 
and he told a story about Blondin crossing 
Niagara. 

"Would you," said he, ''when certain death 
waited on a single false step, would you cry out, 
*Blondin, stoop a little more! Go a little faster! 
Slow up ! Lean more to the north ! Lean a little 
more to the south'? No; you would keep your 
mouths shut. 

''Now, we are doing the best we can. We 
are pegging away at the rebels. We have just 
as big a job on hand as was ever intrusted to 
mortal hands to manage. The Government is 
carrying an immense weight; so, don't badger 



2i6 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

it. Keep silent, and we will get you safe 
across." 

No delegation of Senators ever again at- 
tempted to dictate to Abraham Lincoln the man- 
ner in which our end of the Civil War should 
be conducted. 

Stanton's obstinacy 

Assistant Adjutant-General Long narrates the 
following incident. Some outsiders had per- 
suaded Lincoln to adopt a certain line of policy 
which apparently was impolitic, and Stanton re- 
fused to carry out the order. The President 
called on the great war Secretary, who substan- 
tially demonstrated to him that he was wrong, 
and repeated that he shouldn't carry out the or- 
der. Lincoln sat carelessly on a lounge nursing 
his left leg, and said: 'T reckon it'll have to be 
done, Mr. Secretary." "Well, I sha'n't do it," 
said Stanton. It was getting unpleasant for the 
Adjutant-General, and he started to go. As he 
passed through the door, he heard the President 
say good-humoredly, 'T reckon you'll have to do 
it, Mr. Secretary." In half an hour the order 
came over, signed by Stanton. 

Another story, although it is worn thread- 
bare, should be repeated here. It is said that 
Lincoln sent some one to Stanton for some ac- 
tion and the party returned saying that the Sec- 
retary wouldn't do it. "Then I can't help you," 
said Lincoln, "for I have very little influence 
with this Administration." And another story 
is also told of the President waiting to complete 
some action till Stanton had temporarily left the 
capital, and then putting it through under the 
sanction of the Assistant Secretary of War. 



CHAPTER XX 
Civil War Begins : Fall of Fort Sumter 

When Lincoln took the Government at 
Washington, it may well be believed that he 
found matters in a condition decidedly chaotic. 
His task was many-sided, a greater task, as he 
had justly said, than that of Washington. First, 
of the fifteen slave States seven had seceded. It 
was his purpose to hold the remaining eight, or 
as many of them as possible. Of this number, 
Delaware and Maryland could have been held by 
force. Kentucky and Missouri, though slave 
States, remained in the Union. The Union 
party in Tennessee, under the lead of Andrew 
Johnson, made a strong fight against secession, 
but failed to prevent the passage of the ordi- 
nance. 

The next task of Lincoln was to unite the 
North as far as possible. The difficulty of doing 
this has already been set forth. On the other 
hand there was in the North a sentiment that 
had been overlooked. It was devotion to the 
flag. Benjamin F. Butler, though an ardent 
Democrat, had cautioned his Southern brethren 
that while they might count on a large pro- 
slavery vote in the North, war was a different 
matter. The moment you fire on the flag, he 
said, you unite the North ; and if war comes, 
slavery goes. 

Not the least task of the President was in 
dealing with foreign nations. The sympathies 



2i8 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

of these, especially England and France, were 
ardently with the South. They would eagerly 
grasp at the slightest excuse for acknowledging 
the Southern Confederacy as an independent na- 
tion. It was a delicate and difficult matter so 
to guide affairs that the desired excuse for this 
could not be found. 

DEFENCE^ BUT NOT AGGRESSION 

Lincoln held steadily to the two promises of 
his inaugural. First, that he would hold the 
United States forts, and second, that he would 
not be the aggressor. 'Tn your hands, my dis- 
satisfied fellow-countrymen, and not in mine, is 
the momentous issue of civil war. The Gov- 
ernment will not assail you. You can have no 
conflict without being yourselves the aggressors. 
You have no oath registered in heaven to de- 
stroy the Government; while I have the most 
solemn one to 'preserve, protect, and defend' it." 

To this plan he adhered. If there was to be 
war it must be begun by the enemies of the coun- 
try, and the Government would patiently bear 
outrages rather than do a thing which could be 
tortured into an appearance of "invading the 
South" or being an aggressor of any sort. 

FORT SUMTER 

Meanwhile, Major Anderson was beleaguered 
in Fort Sumter. He had a handful of men, 76 
combatants and 128 all told. He had insufficient 
ammunition and was nearly out of provisions. 
Lincoln at last concluded to "send bread to 
Sumter" — surely not a hostile act. Owing to 



CIVIL WAR BEGINS 219 

complications which he inherited from Buchan- 
an's Administration, he had given to Governor 
Pickens of South CaroHna a promise that he 
w^ould not attempt to reHeve Sumter without 
first giving him notice. He now sent him notice 
that there would be an attempt to provision 
Sumter peaceably if possible, otherwise by force. 

All this while the Southerners were busy per- 
fecting their fortifications, which were now over- 
whelmingly better, both in number and in com- 
pleteness of appointment, than the one fort held 
by the United States that rightfully controlled 
the entire harbor. General Beauregard was in 
command of the military forces. He sent to 
Major Anderson a summons to surrender. The 
latter replied that if he received from Wash- 
ington no further direction, and if he was not 
succored by the 15th of the month, April, he 
would surrender on honorable terms. It was 
characteristic of the Southern general that he 
intercepted Major Anderson's mail before noti- 
fying him of hostilities. It was characteristic 
of Lincoln that he sent notice to Governor 
Pickens of the intended provisioning of the 
fort. 

On Friday, April 12, 1861, at 3:30 p.m., 
General Beauregard gave notice to Major An- 
derson that he would open fire on Fort Sumter 
in one hour. Promptly at the minute the first 
gun was fired and the war had begun. Bat- 
teries from various points poured shot and shell 
into Sumter till nightfall caused a respite. 

The next day the officers' quarters were set on 
fire, either by an exploding shell or by hot shot. 
The men fought the fiames gallantly, but the 
wind was unfavorable. Then the water-tanks 



2 20 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

were destroyed. As the flames approached the 
magazine, the powder had to be removed ; as 
they approached the places where the powder 
was newly stored, it had to be thrown into the 
sea to prevent explosion. In the mean time the 
stars and stripes were floating gloriously. The 
flag-pole had been struck seven times on Friday. 
It was struck three times the next day. The 
tenth shot did the work, the pole broke and the 
flag fell to the ground at one o'clock Saturday 
afternoon. An officer and some men seized the 
flag, rigged up a jury-mast on the parapet, and 
soon it was flying again. 

But ammunition was gone, the fire was not 
extinguished, and there was no hope of relief. 
Negotiations were opened, and terms of surren- 
der were arranged by eight o'clock that even- 
ing. The next day, Sunday, April 14, the gar- 
rison saluted the flag as it was lowered, and then 
marched out, prisoners of war. Sumter had 
fallen. The Administration had not invaded or 
threatened invasion, but the South had fired on 
the flag. 

EFFECT, SOUTH AND NORTH 

The effect of the fall of Sumter was amazing. 
In the South it was hailed with ecstatic delight, 
especially in Charleston. There was a popular 
demonstration at Montgomery, Ala., the pro- 
visional seat of the Confederate Government. 

The effect upon the North was no less pro- 
found. There was a perfect storm of indigna- 
tion against the people who had presumed to 
fire on the flag. Butler's prediction proved to be 
nearly correct. This did unite the North in de- 
fence of the flag. Butler was a conspicuous 



CIVIL WAR BEGINS 221 

example of this effect. Though a Breckinridge 
Democrat, he promptly offered his services for 
the defence of the country. 

It was recollected throughout the North that 
Lincoln had been conciliatory to a fault toward 
the South. Conciliation had failed because that 
was not what the Southerners wanted. They 
wanted war and by them was war made. This 
put an end forever to all talk of concession and 
compromise. 

WHAT THE PRESIDENT HAD ALREADY DONE 

At the date of the fall of Sumter, Lincoln had 
been in office less than six weeks. In addition 
to routine work^ to attending to extraordinary 
calls in great numbers, he had accomplished cer- 
tain very important things. He had the loyal 
devotion of a Cabinet noted for its ability and 
diversity. He had the enthusiastic confidence of 
the doubtful minds of the North. He had made 
it impossible for the European monarchies to 
recognize the South as a nation. So far as our 
country was concerned, he might ask for any- 
thing, and he got what he asked. These were 
no mean achievements. The far-seeing states- 
man had played for this and had won. 

UPRISING OF THE NORTH 

The indignation caused by the fall of Sumter 
was followed by an outburst of patriotism 
through the entire North such as is not witnessed 
many times in a century. On Sunday morning, 
April 14, it was known tlmt terms of surrender 
had been arranged. On that day and on many 



222 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

succeeding Sundays the voices from a thousand 
pulpits sounded with the certainty of the bugle 
the call to the defence of the flag. Editors echoed 
the call. Such newspapers as were suspected of 
secession tendencies were compelled to hoist the 
American flag. For the time at least, enthusi- 
asm and patriotism ran very high. Those who 
were decidedly in sympathy with the South re- 
mained quiet, and those who were of a doubtful 
mind were swept along with the tide of popular 
feeling. The flag had been fired on. That one 
fact unified the North. 

DOUGLAS SUPPORTS THE PRESIDENT 

On that same evening Senator Douglas ar- 
ranged for a private interview with President 
Lincoln. For two hours these men, rivals and 
antagonists of many years, were in confidential 
conversation. What passed between them no 
man knows, but the result of the conference was 
quickly made public. Douglas came out of the 
room as determined a ''war Democrat" as could 
be found between the oceans. He himself pre- 
pared a telegram which was everywhere pub- 
lished, declaring that he would sustain the Presi- 
dent in defending the Constitution. 

Lincoln had prepared his call for 75,000 vol- 
imteer troops. Douglas thought the number 
should have been 200,000. So it should and 
doubtless it would have been but for certain in- 
iquities of Buchanan's maladministration. There 
were no arms, accoutrements, clothing, available 
for the Union armies. Floyd had well-nigh 
stripped the Northern arsenals. 

Seventy-five thousand was about five times the 



CIVIL WAR BEGINS 223 

number of soldiers then in the army of the 
United States. Though the number of volun- 
teers was small, their proportion to the regular 
army was large. 

CALL FOR VOLUNTEERS 

That night Lincoln's call and Douglas's in- 
dorsement were sent over the wires. Next 
morning the two documents were published in 
every daily paper north of Mason and Dixon's 
line. 

This call for troops met with prompt response. 
The various Governors of the Northern States 
offered many times their quota. The first in the 
field was Massachusetts. This was due to the 
foresight of ex-Governor Banks. He had for 
years kept the State militia up to a high degree 
of efficiency. When rallied upon this he ex- 
plained that it was to defend the country against 
a rebellion of the slaveholders which was sure 
to come. 

THE BALTIMORE MOB 

The call for volunteers was published on the 
morning of April 15. By ten o'clock the Sixth 
Massachusetts regiment began to rendezvous. 
In less than thirty-six hours the regiment was 
ready and off for Washington. It was every- 
where cheered with much enthusiasm, until it 
reached Baltimore, where the reception was of a 
very different sort. Some ruffians of that city 
had planned to assassinate Lincoln in Febru- 
ary, and now, gathering a mob, they attacked 
the soldiers who were hastening to the de- 
fence of the national capital. Here was the 



2 24 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

first bloodshed of the war. The casualties of 
the regiment were four killed and thirty-six 
wounded. 

When the regiment reached Washington, the 
march from the railway station was very solemn." 
Behind the marching soldiers followed the* 
stretchers bearing the wounded. The dead had 
been left behind. Governor Andrew's despatch 
to Mayor Brown — ''Send them home tenderly" 
— elicited the sympathy of millions of hearts. 

The Mayor of Baltimore and the Governor oi 
Maryland sent a deputation to Lincoln to ask 
that no more troops be brought through thai 
city. The President made no promise, but he 
said he was anxious to avoid all friction anc. 
would do the best he could. He added playfully 
that if he granted that, they would be back next 
day to ask that no troops be sent around Balti- 
more. 

That was exactly what occurred. The com 
mittee were back the next day protesting agains 
permitting any troops to cross the State o 
Maryland. Lincoln replied that, as they couldn' 
march around the State, nor tunnel under it, nO:,, 
fly over it, he guessed they would have to marc?" 
across it. 

It was arranged that for the time being th 
troops should be brought to Annapolis an,|^ 
transported thence to Washington by water 
This was one of the many remarkable instance ^ 
of forbearance on the part of the Government. 
There was a great clamor at the North for ven- 
geance upon Baltimore for its crime, and a de- 
mand for sterner measures in future. But the 
President was determined to show all possible 
conciliation in this case, as he did in a hundred 



CIVIL WAR BEGINS 225 

Others. These actions bore good fruit. It se- 
cured to him the confidence of the people to a 
degree that could not have been foreseen. 

"contrabands'"' 

Very early in the war the question of slavery 
confronted the generals. In May, only about 
two months after the inauguration, Generals 
Butler and McClellan dealt with the subject, and 
their methods were as widely different as well 
could be. When Butler was in charge of Fort 
Monroe, three negroes fled to that place for 
refuge. They said that Colonel Mallory had set 
them to work upon the Confederate fortifica- 
tions. A flag of truce was sent in from the 
Confederate lines demanding the return of the 
negroes. Butler replied: 'T shall retain the ne- 
groes as contraband of war. You were using 
them upon your batteries ; it is merely a question 
whether they shall be used for or against us." 
From that time the word contraband was used 
in common speech to indicate an escaped slave. 

DEATH OF COLONEL ELLSWORTH 

The early victims of the war caused deep and 
profound sympathy. The country was not yet 
• used to carnage. The expectancy of a people 
not experienced in war was at high tension, and 
the deaths which at any time would have pro- 
duced profound feeling were emphatically im- 
pressive at that time. 

One of the first martyrs of the war was 
Ephraim Elmer Ellsworth. He was young, 
handsome, impetuous. In Chicago he had or- 



2 26 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

ganized a company of cadet zouaves that drew 
great crowds at every public drill. 

In 1 86 1 Ellsworth was employed in the office 
of Lincoln and Herndon in Springfield, 111. 
When the President elect journeyed to Wash- 
ington, Ellsworth, to whom Lincoln was deeply 
attached, made one of his party. At the out- 
break of hostilities he raised a zouave regiment 
of firemen in New York, and became its colonel. 

On the right bank of the Potomac, six miles 
below Washington, was Alexandria. The keeper 
of the Marshall House, a hotel in that place, had 
run up a secession flag on the mast at the top 
of the building. This flag floated day after day 
in full sight of Lincoln and Ellsworth and many 
others. 

Ellsworth led an advance upon Alexandria on 
the evening of May 23. The next morning, as 
usual, the secession flag floated tauntingly from 
the Marshall House. Ellsworth's blood was up and 
he resolved to take down that flag and hoist the 
stars and stripes with his own hand. Taking with 
him two soldiers, he accomplished his purpose. 

Returning by a spiral stairway, he carried the 
Confederate flag in his hand. The proprietor of 
the hotel came out from a place of concealment, 
placed his double-barreled shotgun almost against 
Ellsworth's body, and fired. The assassin was 
instantly shot down by private Brownell, but 
Ellsworth was dead. 

The body was removed to Washington, where 
it lay in state in the White House till burial. 
The President, amid all the cares of that busy 
period, found time to sit many hours beside the 
body of his friend, and at the burial he appeared 
as chief mourner. 



CHAPTER XXI 

Lincoln and His Generals 

The kindness and patience of President Lin- 
coln in dealing with the generals who did not 
succeed is, as Helen Nicolay has said, "the won- 
der of all who study the history of the Civil 
War. The letters he wrote to them show, better 
than whole vohimes of description could do, the 
hopeful and forbearing spirit in which he sought 
to aid them. Mr. Lincoln's nature was too for- 
giving, and the responsibihty that lay upon him 
was too heavy for personal resentment." 

JOHN CHARLES FREMONT 

At the opening of the war Fremont was in 
Paris and was at once summoned home. He 
arrived in this country about July i, 1861, and 
the President appointed him Major-General in 
the regular army. On July 3 he was assigned to 
the Western Department, with headquarters at 
St. Louis. This department included the State 
of Illinois and extended as far west as the Rocky 
Mountains. 

Generals Lyon, Hunter, and others were sore 
pressed in Missouri. They needed the presence 
of their commander and they needed him at once. 
Fremont was ordered to proceed to his post im- 
mediately. This order he did not obey. He 
could never brook authority, and he was not in 
the habit of rendering good reasons for his acts 



22 8 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

of disobedience. Though he was aware that the 
need of his presence was urgent, he dalhed about 
Washington a long time and then proceeded west 
with leisure, arriving in St. Louis nearly three 
weeks later than he should have done. 

Though ,Fremont had so unaccountably de- 
layed, yet when he came he was received with 
confidence and enthusiasm. Lincoln gave to him, 
as he did to all his generals, almost unlimited 
authority to act. His instructions were general, 
and the commander was left to work out the 
details in his own way. All that the President 
required was that something should be done suc- 
cessfully in the prosecution of the war. 

The first thing Fremont did in Missouri was 
to quarrel with his best friends, the Blair family. 
This is important chiefly as indicating his in- 
ability to hold the confidence of intelligent and 
influential men. About this time Lincoln wrote 
to General Hunter the following personal let- 
ter, which showed well how things were likely 
to go. 

"My dear Sir : General Fremont needs assist- 
ance which it is difficult to give him. He is 
losing the confidence of men near him, whose 
support any man in his position must have to 
be successful. His cardinal mistake is that he 
isolates himself and allows no one to see him, 
by which he does not know what is going on in 
the very matter he is dealing with. He needs to 
have by his side a man of large experience. Will 
you not, for me^ take that place?" 

The next move of Fremont was to issue a 
proclamation of emanc^'nation. This was prop- 
erly a civil act, while Fremont " "':er of 
military, not civil, authority, ine act was un- 



LINCOLN AND HIS GENERALS 229 

authorized ; the President was not even con- 
sulted. 

When this came to the knowledge of the Presi- 
dent he took prompt measures to counteract it 
in a way that would accomplish the greatest good 
with the least harm. He wrote to the General: 

''Allow me, therefore, to ask that you will, as 
of your own motion, modify that paragraph so 
as to conform to the first and fourth sections of 
the act of Congress entitled, *An act to confis- 
cate property used for insurrectionary purposes,' 
approved August 6, 1861, and a copy of which act 
I herewith send you. This letter is written in 
a spirit of caution, and not of censure." 

But Fremont was willing to override both 
President and Congress, and declined to make 
the necessary modifications. Matters grew no 
better with him, but much worse, for three 
months. The words of Nicolay and Hay are 
none too strong: "He had frittered away his 
opportunity for usefulness and fame ; such an 
opportunity, indeed, as rarely comes." 

On October 21 the President sent by special 
messenger an order relieving General Fremont 
and placing Hunter temporarily in command. 

Fremont had one more chance. He was 
placed in command of a corps in Virginia. There 
he disobeyed orders in a most flagrant manner, 
and by so doing permitted Jackson and his army 
to escape. He was superseded by Pope, but de- 
clining to serve under a junior officer, resigned. 
And that was the end of Fremont as a public 
man. 



230 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 



GEORGE B. MCCLELLAN 

McClellan was a very different man from Fre- 
mont. Though he was as nearly as possible op- 
posite in his characteristics, still it was not easier 
to get along with him. He was a man of bril- 
liant talents, fine culture, and charming person- 
ality. Graduating from West Point in 1846, he 
went almost immediately into the Mexican War, 
where he earned his captaincy. 

At the outbreak of the Civil War this captain 
was by the Governor of Ohio commissioned as 
Major-General, and a few days later he received 
from Lincoln the commission of Major-General 
in the United States Army. 

He was sent to West Virginia with orders to 
drive out the enemy. This he achieved in a short 
time, and for it he received the thanks of Con- 
gress. He was rapidly promoted from one posi- 
tion to another until age and infirmity compelled 
the retirement of that grand old warrior, Win- 
field Scott, whereupon he was made General-in- 
chief of the armies of the United States. 

As already intimated, it was Lincoln's habit to 
let his generals do their work in their own way, 
only insisting that they should accomplish visible 
and tangible results. This method he followed 
with McClellan, developing it with great patience 
under trying circumstances. On this point there 
is no better witness than McClellan himself. To 
his wife he wrote: 'They give me my way in 
everything, full swing and unbounded con- 
fidence.'' Later he expressed contempt for the 
President who "showed him too much defer- 
ence." 

Instead of calling on the President to re- 



LINCOLN AND HIS GENERALS 231 

port, AlcClellan made it necessary for the Presi- 
dent to call on him. At other times he would 
keep the President waiting while he affected 
to be busy with subordinates. Once, indeed, he 
left the President waiting while he went to l3ed. 
All this Lincoln bore with his accustomed pa- 
tience. He playfully said, when remonstrated 
with, that he would gladly hold McClellan's horse 
if he would only win the battles. This McClel- 
lan failed to do, and when he was finally relieved, 
he had worn out even the President's patience. 

mcclellan's conceit 

''McClellan," says Miss Tarbell, "seems to 
have felt from the first that Mr. Lincoln's kind- 
ness was merely a personal recognition of his 
own military genius. He had conceived the 
idea that it was he alone who was to save the 
country." 

*'The people call upon me to save the country," 
he wrote to his wife. 'T must save it, and can- 
not respect anything that is in the way." . . . 
"The President cannot or will not see the true 
state of affairs." 

Lincoln, in his anxiety to know the details of 
the work in the army, went frequently to Mc- 
Clellan's headquarters. That the President had 
a serious purpose in these visits McClellan did 
not see. 

"I enclose a card just received from 'A. Lin- 
coln,' " he wrote to his wife one day; "it shows 
too much deference to be seen outside." 

In another letter to Mrs. McClellan he spoke 
of being "interrupted" by the President and Sec- 
retary Seward, "who had nothing particular to 



23 2 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

say," and again of concealing himself, "to dodge 
all enemies in the shape of 'browsing' Presidents, 
etc." His plans he kept to himself, and when 
in the Cabinet meetings, to which he was con- 
stantly summoned, military matters were dis- 
cussed, he seemed to feel that it was an encroach- 
ment on his special business. 

"I am becoming daily more disgusted with this 
Administration — perfectly sick of it," he wrote 
at another time; and a few days later: "I was 
obliged to attend a meeting of the Cabinet at 
8 P.M., and was bored and annoyed. There are 
some of the greatest geese in the Cabinet I have 
ever seen — enough to tax the patience of Job." 

''a great engineer" 

Because of McClellan's "masterly inactivity" 
the words, "All quiet along the Potomac" became 
a byword of bitterness throughout the North. 

Lincoln said one day with a sad smile : "Mc- 
Clellen is a great engineer, but he has a special 
talent for a stationary engine." 

ULYSSES S. GRANT 

At the very time the Army of the Potomac 
was apparently doing nothing — winning no vic- 
tories, destroying no armies, making no perma- 
nent advances — there was a man in the West 
who was building up for himself a remarkable 
reputation. He was all the while winning vic- 
tories, destroying armies, making advances. The 
instant one thing was accomplished he turned his 
energies to a new task. This was Grant. 

He was a graduate of West Point, had seen 



LINCOLN AND HIS GENERALS 233 

service in the Mexican War, and ultimately rose 
to the grade of captain. At the outbreak of the 
war he was in business with his father in Galena, 
111. Lincoln kept watch of him. He began to 
think that Grant was the man who should com- 
mand the armies. 

Lincoln's acknowledgment 

The President's trustful way of dealing with 
his generals is so well illustrated in a letter to 
Grant that, for this reason, as well as for the 
intrinsic interest of the letter, it is here given 
in full. 

''My dear General : I do not remember that 
you and I ever met personally. I write this now 
as a grateful acknowledgment for the almost in- 
estimable service you have done the country. I 
wish to say a word further. When you first 
reached the vicinity of Vicksburg, I thought you 
should do what you finally did — march the troops 
across the neck, run the batteries with the trans- 
ports, and thus ga below ; and I never had any 
faith, except a general hope that you knew better 
than I, that the Yazoo Pass expedition and the 
like could succeed. When you got below and 
took Port Gibson, Grand Gulf, and vicinity, I 
thought you should go down the river and join 
General Banks ; and when you turned north- 
ward, east of the Big Black, I thought it was a 
mistake. I now wish to make the personal ac- 
knowledgment that you were right and I was 
wrong." 

There was surely no call for this confession, 
no reason for the letter, except the bigness of the 
writer's heart. It was just such a letter as a 



234 'ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

father might write a son. It was the production 
of a high grade of manhness. 

THE PRESIDENT DEFENDS GRANT 

Prominence always brings envy, fault-finding, 
hostility. From this Grant did not escape. The 
more brilliant and uniform his successes, the 
more clamorous a certain class of people became. 
When they argued that Grant could not possibly 
be a good soldier, Lincoln replied, "I like him ; he 
fights." When they charged him with drunken- 
ness, Lincoln jocularly proposed that they ascer- 
tain the brand of the whiskey he drank and buy 
up a large amount of the same sort to send to 
his other generals, so that they might win vic- 
tories like him ! 

Grant's important victories in the West came 
in rapid and brilliant succession. Forts Henry 
and Donelson were captured in February, 1862. 
The battle of Shiloh, or Pittsburg Landing, was 
fought in April of the same year. Vicksburg 
surrendered July 4, 1863. And the battle of 
Chattanooga took place in November of that 
year. 

LIEUTENANT-GENERAL 

In February, 1864, Congress passed an act 
creating the office of Lieutenant-General. The 
President approved that act on Washington's 
birthday, and nominated Grant for that office. 
The Senate confirmed this nomination on March 
2, and Grant was ordered to report at Wash- 
ington. 

With his usual promptness he started at once 
for the capital, arriving there March 8. The 



LINCOLN AND HIS GENERALS 235 

laconic conversation which took place between 
the President and the general has been reported 
about as follows: 

''What do you want me to do?" 
*'To take Richmond. Can you do it?" 
*'Yes, if you furnish me troops enough." 

DUTY FIRST 

As soon as he received his commission, Grant 
visited the Army of the Potomac. Upon his 
return Mrs. Lincoln planned to give a dinner in 
his honor. But this was not to his taste. He 
said, ''Mrs. Lincoln must excuse me. I must 
be in Tennessee at a given time." 

"But," rephed the President, "we can't excuse 
you. Mrs. Lincoln's dinner without you would 
be Hamlet with Hamlet left out." 

"I appreciate the honor Mrs. Lincoln would do 
me," he said, "but time is very important now — 
and really — Mr. Lincoln — I have had enough of 
this show business." 

On March 17 General Grant assumed com- 
mand of the armies of the United States with 
headquarters in the field. He was evidently in 
earnest. As Lincoln had cordially offered help 
and encouragement to all the other generals, so 
he did to Grant. The difference between one 
general and another was not due to Lincoln's 
offer of help, or refusal to give it, but there was 
a difference in the way in which his offers were 
received and acted upon. 



236 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 



THE PRESIDENT STUDIES MILITARY SCIENCE 

It has been recorded that Lincoln had, for the 
sake of comprehending the significance of one 
word, mastered Euchd after he became a lawyer. 
There is a similar evidence of the same thor- 
oughness and force of will. During the months 
when the Union armies were accomplishing noth- 
ing, he procured the necessary books and set him- 
self, in the midst of all his administrative cares, 
to the task of learning the science of war. That 
he achieved more than ordinary success will now 
surprise no one who is familiar with his char- 
acter. His military sagacity is attested by so 
high an authority as General Sherman. Other 
generals have expressed their surprise and grati- 
fication at his knowledge and penetration in mili- 
tary affairs. 

GREAT FELLOW-WORKERS 

Side by side Lincoln and Grant labored, each 
in his own department, until the war was ended 
and their work was done. Though so different, 
they were actuated by the same spirit. Not even 
the Southern generals themselves had deeper 
sympathy with, or greater tenderness for, the 
mass of the Confederate soldiers. It was the 
same magnanimity in Lincoln and Grant that 
sent the conquered army, after final defeat, back 
to the industries of peace that the men might 
be able to provide against their sore needs. 

WILLIAM T. SHERMAN 

Norman Hapgood, in his excellent Abraham 
Lincoln, gives us some pleasant glimpses of the 



LINCOLN AND HIS GENERALS 237 

President's relations with General Sherman, 
which we take the liberty of presenting here. 

General Sherman first met Lincoln in March, 
1 86 1, when he was introduced by his brother 
John, who said, "Mr. President, this is my 
brother. Colonel Sherman, who is just up from 
Louisiana; he may give you some information 
you want." 

"Ah," said Lincoln, "how are they getting 
along down there?" 

"They think they are getting along swim- 
mingly — they are preparing for war." 

"Oh, well," replied the President, "I guess 
we'll manage to keep house." 

The young soldier was disgusted enough, and 
emphatically told his brother what he thought of 
politicians in general. 

After Bull Run Sherman received a pleasanter 
impression of his chief. He saw him riding one 
day with Seward in an open hack and asked if 
they were going to his camps. 

"Yes," said Lincoln; "we heard that you had 
got over the big scare, and we thought we would 
come over and see the boys." 

As always after a defeat, the President wanted 
to encourage everybody, and wished to address 
the soldiers. Sherman asked him to discourage 
cheering, noise, or other confusion, saying they 
had had enough of that before Bull Run to ruin 
any lot of fighting men. Lincoln took the sug- 
gestion with good nature. He then made from 
his carriage what Sherman calls "one of the 
neatest, best, and most feeling addresses I ever 
listened to." At one or two points the soldiers 
began to cheer. "Don't cheer, boys," said Lin- 
coln, "I confess I rather like it myself, but Colo- 



238 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

nel Sherman here says it is not military, and I 
guess we had better defer to his opinion." In 
conclusion, he told the men that as he was their 
Commander-in-chief, he was determined the sol- 
diers should have everything the law allowed, 
and requested them to appeal to him personally 
if they were wronged. *'The effect of this 
speech," says Sherman, *Svas excellent." 

Later an officer forced his way through the 
crowd, and said, '*Mr. President, I have a griev- 
ance." He then told that Colonel Sherman had 
threatened to shoot him. After looking at him, 
and then at Sherman, Lincoln, stepping toward 
the officer, said, in a stage whisper, "Well, if I 
were you, and he threatened to shoot, I wouldn't 
trust him, for I believe he would do it." 

The officer left and the men laughed. Sher- 
man explained the facts, and Lincoln said, "Of 
course, I didn't know anything about it, but I 
thought you knew your own business best." 

Lincoln's relations to Sherman after he came 
to high command were of the most friendly sort. 
He told him later in the war that he was always 
grateful to him and to Grant because they never 
scolded him. 

AN ANTICLIMAX 

''Lincoln," says Noah Brooks, "always com- 
posed slowly, and he often wrote and rewrote 
his more elaborate productions several times. I 
happened to be with him often while he was 
composing his message to Congress, which was 
sent in while Sherman was on his march through 
Georgia. There was much speculation as to 
where Sherman had gone, and the secret was 
very well preserved. The President hoped, from 



LINCOLN AND HIS GENERALS 239 

day to day, that Sherman would be heard from, 
or that something would happen to enlighten 
'and possibly congratulate the country,' as he 
put it. But December came and there were no 
tidings from Sherman, though everybody was 
hungry with expectation, and feverish with anx- 
iety. 

"The President's message was first written with 
pencil on stiff sheets of white pasteboard, or box- 
board, a good supply of which he kept by him. 
These sheets, five or six inches wide, could be 
laid on the writer's knee, as he sat comfortably 
in his armchair, in his favorite position, with his 
legs crossed. One night, taking one of these 
slips out of his drawer, with a great affectation 
of confidential secrecy, he said: 

*' T expect you want to know all about Sher- 
man's raid?' 

"Naturally I answered in the affirmative, when 
he said : 

" 'Well, then, I'll read you this paragraph from 
my message.' 

"The paragraph, however, was curiously non- 
committal, merely referring to 'General Sher- 
man's attempted march of three hundred miles 
directly through the insurgent region,' and gave 
no indication whatever of the direction of the 
march, or of the point from which news from 
him was expected. 

"Laying the paper down and taking off his 
spectacles, the President laughed heartily at my 
disappointment, but added, kindly, 

" 'Well, my dear fellow, that's all that Con- 
gress will know about it, anyhow.' " 



240 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 



THE PRESIDENTS WAR DESPATCHES 

Lincoln was sometimes critical and even sar- 
castic when events moved slowly, or when un- 
satisfactory results that seemed to be demanded 
by the immediate conditions were lacking, but 
he never failed to commend when good news 
came, as in the following: 

''August 17, 1864, 10.30 A.M. 
''Lieutenant-General Grant, City Point, Va. : 
I have seen your despatch expressing unwilling- 
ness to break your hold where you are. Neither 
am I willing. Hold on with a bulldog grip, and 
chew and choke as much as possible. 

"A. Lincoln." 



ADVICE TO HOOKER 

On June 5, 1863, Lincoln warned General 
Hooker not to run any risk of being entangled 
on the Rappahannock "like an ox jumped half 
over a fence and liable to be torn by dogs, front 
and rear, without a fair chance to gore one way 
or kick the other." 

June 10 he warned Hooker not to go south 
of the Rappahannock upon Lee's moving north 
of it. "I think Lee's army, and not Richmond 
is your true objective point. H he comes toward 
the upper Potomac, follow on his flank, and on 
the inside track, shortening your lines while he 
lengthens his. Fight him, too, when opportunity 
offers, n he stay where he is, fret him, and fret 
him." 

June 14 he says : "So far as we can make out 
here, the enemy have Milroy surrounded at Win- 



LINCOLN AND HIS GENERALS 241 

Chester and Tyler at Martlnsburg. If they could 
hold out for a few days, could you help them? 
If the head of Lee's army is at Martinsburg, and 
the tail of it on the plank road between Freder- 
icksburg and Chancellorsville, the animal must 
be very slim somewhere ; could you not break 
him?" 

HOW LINCOLN SWORE 

On one occasion, Lincoln, when entering the 
telegraph office, was heard to remark to Secre- 
tary Seward, "By jings! Governor, we are here 
at last." Turning to him in a reproving manner, 
Mr. Seward said, *'Mr. President, where did you 
learn that inelegant expression?" Without re- 
plying to the Secretary, Mr. Lincoln addressed 
the operators, saying: 

"Young gentlemen, excuse me for swearing 
before you. *By jings' is swearing, for my good 
mother taught me that anything that had a 'by' 
before it was swearing." 

The only time, however, that Lincoln was ever 
heard really to swear in the telegraph office was 
on the occasion of his receiving a telegram from 
Burnside, who had been ordered a week before 
to go to the relief of Rosecrans, at Chattanooga, 
then in great danger of an attack from Bragg. On 
that day Burnside telegraphed from Jonesboro, 
farther away from Rosecrans than he was when 
he received the order to hurry toward him. 
When Burnside's telegram was placed in Lin- 
coln's hands he said, ''Damn Jonesboro." He 
then telegraphed Burnside: 



242 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

''September 21, 1863. 
"If you are to do any good to Rosecrans it will 
not do to waste time with Jonesboro. . . . 

"A. Lincoln." 

AN IMPOSSIBLE TASK 

An officer of low volunteer rank persisted in 
telling and retelling his troubles to the President 
on a summer afternoon when Lincoln was tired 
and careworn. After listening patiently, he 
finally turned upon the man, and, looking wear- 
ily out upon the broad Potomac in the distance, 
said in a peremptory tone that ended the inter- 
"view: 

''Now, my man, go away, go away! I cannot 
meddle in your case. I could as easily bail out 
the Potomac River with a teaspoon as to attend 
to all the details of the army." 



CHAPTER XXII 
Lincoln and His Soldiers 

Lincoln's life, says James Morgan, in his 
Abraham Lincoln, was filled with striking con- 
trasts. For this careless captain of a company 
of unruly rustics in the Black Hawk War to be- 
come the Commander-in-chief of a million sol- 
diers, a mightier force of warriors than any 
conquering monarch of modern times ever as- 
sembled, was perhaps the strangest fortune that 
befell him. In four years he called to his com- 
mand two and a half millions of men, probably 
a greater number than followed the eagles of 
Napoleon in all his twenty years of campaigning 
from Areola to Waterloo. 

Yet, as Morgan tells us, this unparalleled mar- 
tial power never touched the ambition of Lin- 
coln. He cared nothing for the pomp of arms, 
the pride of rank, or the glory of war. This 
man, who could say to ten hundred thousand 
armed troops, go, and they would go, come, and 
they would come, held himself to be no more 
than the equal of the least among them. While 
he stood toward all as a comrade rather than a 
commander, they looked up to him in perfect 
trust, and delighted to hail him as ''Father 
Abraham." 

It was enough for him to touch his hat to a 
general, but he liked to bare his head to the 
boys in the ranks. He himself created generals 



244 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

by the hundreds, but in his eyes the private sol- 
dier was the handiwork of the Almighty. 

If he passed the White House guard twenty 
times a day, he always saluted its members. He 
knew by name every man in the company which 
watched over him in his rest at the Soldiers' 
Home, and was the real friend of all, heartily 
enjoying an occasional cup of coffee at their 
mess and the little jokes they played on one 
another. K any were missing, he noticed their 
absence, and if they were sick, he never forgot 
to ask about them. 

The many military hospitals, crowded with 
human suffering, that sprang up in Washington, 
were his special care. He visited and cheered 
the wounded, pausing beside their cots of pain, 
bending upon them his pitying gaze and laying 
his great hand tenderly on their fevered brows. 
He remembered and watched those who were in 
peril of death, and eagerly welcomed any signs 
of improvement in their condition, while he 
joked with those who were well enough to take 
a joke. 

The sympathy of most men who get to be 
presidents, governors, or statesmen can be 
reached only through their heads. It becomes 
a thing of the mind, filtered and cooled by an 
intellectual process. Lincoln's sympathies al- 
ways remained where nature herself placed them, 
in the heart, and thence they freely flowed, un- 
hindered by reflection and calculation. Kind- 
ness with him was an impulse and not a duty. 
His benevolence was far from scientific, yet he 
was so shrewd a judge of human nature that he 
seldom was cheated. 

The stone walls of the White House no more 



LINCOLN AND HIS SOLDIERS 245 

shut him in from his fellows, from the hopes and 
sorrows, the poverty and the pride of the plain 
people, than did the unhewn logs behind which 
he shivered and hungered in his boyhood home. 
A mother's tears, a baby's cry, a father's plea, an 
empty sleeve, or a crutch never failed to move 
him. 

These beautiful tributes of Morgan are jus- 
tified by all that other biographers of Lincoln 
have told, by all that his reverent countrymen 
so well know of his character and life. 

THE president's LOVE FOR THE SOLDIERS 

To their Commander-in-chief the boys in blue 
were as sons. On him as on no one else the 
burden of the nation's troubles rested. It may 
with reverence be said that he "bore our sor- 
rows, he carried our grief." Not only was this 
true in general, but in specific cases his actions 
showed it. When soldiers were under sentence 
from court-martial — many of them mere boys — 
the sentence came to Lincoln for approval. If 
he could find any excuse whatever for pardon 
he would grant it. His tendency to pardon, his 
leaning toward the side of mercy, became pro- 
verbial, and greatly annoyed some of the gen- 
erals who feared military discipline would be 
destroyed. But he would not turn a deaf ear 
to the plea of mercy, and he could not see in it 
any permanent danger to the Republic. One or 
two examples will stand fairly for a large num- 
ber. When a boy was sentenced to death for de- 
sertion, he said: 

"Must I shoot a simple-minded soldier boy 
who deserts, and not touch a hair of the wily 



246 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

agitator who Induces him to desert ? I think that 
in such a case, to silence the agitator and save 
the boy, is not only constitutional, but withal a 
great mercy." 

Early in the war he pardoned a boy who was 
sentenced to be shot for sleeping at his post as 
sentinel. By way of explanation the President 
said: "I could not think of going into eternity 
with the .blood of that poor young man on my 
skirts. It is not to be wondered at that a boy, 
raised on a farm, probably in the habit of going 
to bed at dark, should, when required to watch, 
fall asleep ; and I cannot consent to shoot him for 
such an act." The sequel is romantic. The dead 
body of this boy was found among the slain on 
the field of the battle of Fredericksburg. Next 
his heart was a photograph of the President 
on which he had written ''God bless President 
Abraham Lincoln !" 



HIS TENDER COMPASSION 

In November, 1864, he wrote to Mrs. Bixby, 
of Boston, Mass., the following letter which 
needs no comment or explanation: 

''Dear Madam : I have been shown, in the files 
of the War Department, a statement of the Ad- 
jutant-General of Massachusetts, that you are 
the mother of five sons who have died gloriously 
on the field of battle. I feel how weak and fruit- 
less must be any words of mine which should 
attempt to beguile you from the grief of a loss 
so overwhelming. But I cannot refrain from 
tendering to you the consolation that may be 
found in the thanks of the Republic they died to 



• LINCOLN AND HIS SOLDIERS 247 

save. I pray that our Heavenly Father may 
assuage the anguish of your bereavement, and 
leave you only the cherished memory of the 
loved and lost, and the solemn pride that must 
be yours to have laid so costly a sacrifice upon 
the altar of freedom. 

"Yours, very sincerely and respectfully, 

"Abraham Lincoln." 



THE PRICE OF PARDON 

The account of Lincoln's interview with Wil- 
liam Scott, a boy from a Vermont farm, who, 
after marching forty-eight hours without sleep, 
volunteered to stand guard for a sick comrade, 
is a very touching story. Weariness overcame 
the young soldier, he was found asleep at his 
post, near the enemy, and was tried and sen- 
tenced to be shot. The President heard of the 
case, went to the tent where Scott was under 
guard, and talked to him kindly, asking about 
his home, his schoolmates, and particularly about 
his mother. The lad took her picture from his 
pocket and showed it to him in silence. Lincoln 
was deeply moved. As he rose to leave, he laid 
his hand on the prisoner's shoulder. 

"My boy," he said, "you are not going to be 
shot to-morrow. I believe you when you tell me 
that you could not keep awake. I am going to 
trust you and send you back to your regiment. 
Now, I want to know what you intend to pay 
for all this?" 

The lad could hardly speak, but at last replied 
that he did not know. He and his people were 
poor, he said, but they would do what they 
could. There was his pay, and a little in the 



248 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

savings-bank. They could borrow something' 
by a mortgage on the farm. Perhaps his com- 
rades would help. If the President would wait 
till pay-day possibly they might get together 
five or six hundred dollars. Would that be 
enough? The President shook his head and 
answered : 

"My bill is a great deal more than that; it is 
a very large one. Your friends cannot pay it, 
nor your family, nor your farm. There is only 
one man in the world who can pay it, and his 
name is William Scott. If from this day he does 
his duty so that when he comes to die he can 
truly say, T have kept the promise I gave the 
President; I have done my duty as a soldier,' 
then the debt will be paid." 

Returning to his regiment, William Scott paid 
the debt in full when, a few months later, he 
gave up his life on the battlefield. 

IGNORING TECHNICALITY 

For terseness, decision, and sensibleness de- 
fiant of military punctilio, nothing could surpass 
the following note sent by the President to the 
Secretary of War. 

'T personally wish Jacob Freese of New Jer- 
sey appointed colonel of a colored regiment, and 
this regardless of whether he can tell the exact 
color of Julius Caesar's hair." 

*'l don't believe shooting will do HIM ANY 

good" 

A Senator in Washington, learning that a 
young soldier whom he had induced to enlist had 



LINCOLN AND HIS SOLDIERS 249 

been sentenced to be shot, went to the Secretary 
of War and urged a reprieve. The Secretary 
repHed : 

*'Too many cases of this kind have been let 
off, and it is time an example was made." 

Finding that all his arguments were in vain, 
the Senator said: 

"Well, Mr. Secretary, the boy is not going to 
be sJiot — of that I give you fair warning!" 

Leaving the War Department, he went directly 
to the Wliite House, although the hour was late. 
After a long parley with the sentry on duty, he 
passed in. The President had retired ; but the 
Senator pressed his way through all obstacles 
to his sleeping-apartment. In an excited man- 
ner he stated that the despatch announcing the 
hour of execution had but just reached him. 

''This man must not be shot, Mr. President," 
said he. 'T can't help what he may have done. 
Why, he is an old neighbor of mine; I can't 
allow him to be shot!" 

Lincoln had remained in bed, quietly listening 
to the protestations of his old friend, who had 
been in Congress with him, and at length said: 

"Well, I don't believe shooting will do him any 
good. Give me that pen." 

And so saying, he prolonged another poor fel- 
low's lease of Hfe. 

THE WOUNDED CONFEDERATE BOY 

On one occasion, when wounded soldiers were 
being removed, as a stretcher was passing Mr. 
Lincoln, he heard the voice of a suffering lad 
calling to his mother in agonizing tones. His 
great heart filled. He forgot the crisis of the 



2 so ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

hour. Stopping the carriers, he knelt, and bend- 
ing over the boy, asked tenderly : 

"What can I do for you, my poor child?" 

"Oh, you will do nothing for me," the boy re- 
plied. *'You are a Yankee. I cannot hope my 
message to my mother will ever reach her." 

Mr. Lincoln, in tears, with a voice of tenderest 
love, convinced the boy of his sincerity, and the 
lad gave his good-by words without reserve. 

These the President directed to be copied and 
sent that night, under a flag of truce, into the 
enemy's lines. 

JUSTICE FOR ALL 

Senator J. F. Wilson, in pleading the cause of 
a soldier wrongfully accused of desertion, and 
finding the Secretary of War inexorable, "ap- 
pealed to Caesar," and procured an overriding 
order from the President, which Stanton finally 
obeyed. When Wilson announced the result to 
Mr. Lincoln, the President said: 

"Well, I am glad you stuck to it, and that it 
ended as it did; for I meant it should so end, 
though I had to give it personal attention. A 
private soldier has as much right to justice as a 
major-general." 

"put yourself in his place" 

The following incident is related by David R. 
Locke ("Petroleum V. Nasby"). 

I was in Washington once more in 1864. . . . 
My business was to secure a pardon for a young 
man from Ohio, who had deserted under rather 
peculiar circumstances. When he enlisted he 
was under engagement to a young girl, and went 



LINCOLN AND HIS SOLDIERS 251 

to the front very certain of her faithfnhiess, as 
a young man should be, and he made an excel- 
lent soldier. ... It is needless to say that the 
young girl had another lover whom she had re- 
jected for the young volunteer. . . . Taking ad- 
vantage of the absence of the favored suitor, the 
discarded one renewed his suit with great vehe- 
mence, and rumors reached the young man at 
the front that his love had gone over to the 
enemy, and that he was in danger of losing her 
altogether. 

He immediately applied for a furlough, 'which 
was refused him, and, half mad and reckless of 
consequences, he deserted. He found the infor- 
mation he had received to be partially true, but 
he came in time. He married the girl, but was 
immediately arrested as a deserter, tried, found 
guilty, and sentenced to be shot. 

I stated the circumstances, giving the young 
fellow a good character, and the President at 
once signed a pardon. 

'T want to punish the young man — probably 
in less than a year he will wish I had withheld 
the pardon. We can't tell, though. I suppose 
when I was a young man I should have done the 
same fool thing." 

HARDTACK NOT GENERALS 

Lincoln particularly liked a joke at the ex- 
pense of the dignity of some high civil or mili- 
tary official. One day, not long before his sec- 
ond inauguration, he asked a friend if he had 
heard about Stanton's meeting a picket on Broad 
River, South Carolina, and then told this story: 

"General Foster, then at Port Royal, escorted 



2 52 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

the Secretary up the river, takmg a quarter- 
master's tug. Reaching the outer Hnes on the 
river, a picket roared from the bank, 'Who have 
you got on board that tug?' The severe and 
dignified answer v^as, 'The Secretary of War 
and Major-General Foster/ Instantly the picket 
roared back, 'We've got major-generals enough 
up here — why don't you bring us up some hard- 
tack?" 

The story tickled Lincoln mightily, and he told 
it until it was replaced by a new one. 



i 



CHAPTER XXIII 

Defeats and Victories 

The first great battle of the Civil War was 
that of Bull Run, so called from the name of the 
small stream near which it was fought, July 21, 
1 86 1. The battlefield was in Virginia, some 
thirty miles southwest of Washington. 

NO ''picnic" 

It is not within the scope of this volume to 
enter into the details of this or any battle. There- 
fore, a few words must suffice here. The Con- 
federates were all day receiving fresh reinforce- 
ments. The Federals had been on their feet since 
two o'clock in the morning. By three o'clock in 
the afternoon, after eleven hours of activity and 
five hours of fighting in the heat of a July day 
in Virginia, these men were tired, thirsty, hun- 
gry — worn out. Then came the disastrous panic 
and the demoralization. A large portion of the 
army started in a race for Washington, the civil- 
ians in the lead. 

The disaster was terrible, but there is nothing 
to gain by magnifying it. Some of the oldest 
and best armies in the world have been broken 
into confusion quite as badly as this army of 
raw recruits. They did not so far lose heart 
that they were not able to make a gallant stand 
at Centerville and successfully check the pursuit 
of the enemy. It was said that Washington was 

253 



254 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

at the mercy of the Confederates, but it is more 
likely that they had so feh the valor of the foe 
that they were unfit to pursue the retreating 
army. It was a hard battle on both sides. No 
one ever accused the Confederates of cowardice, 
and they surely wanted to capture Washington. 
That they did not do so is ample proof that the 
battle was not a picnic to them. It had been 
boasted that one Southern man could whip five 
Northern men. This catchy phrase fell into 
disuse. 

Although the victorious forces were effective- 
ly checked at Centerville, those who fled in ab- 
solute rout and uncontrollable panic were enough 
to give the occasion a lasting place in history. 
Loyal citizens who had gone to see the battle had 
not enjoyed their trip. Northern soldiers who 
had thought that this war was a sort of picnic 
had learned that the foe was formidable. The 
Administration that had expected to crush the in- 
surrection by one decisive blow became vaguely 
conscious of the fact that the war was here to 
stay months and years. 

The effect of the battle of Bull Run on the 
South was greatly to encourage its people and 
add to 'their enthusiasm. The eft'ect on the North 
was to deepen the determination to save the flag, 
to open the people's eyes to the fact that the 
Southern power was strong. With renewed zeal 
they girded themselves for the conflict. 

THE BURDENED PRESIDENT 



But the great burden fell on Lincoln. He was 
disappointed that the insurrection was not and 
could not be crushed by one decisive blow. There 






DEFEATS AND VICTORIES 255 

was need of more time, more men, more money, 
and more blood must be shed. These thoughts 
and the relative duties were to him, with his pe- 
culiar temperament, a severer trial, perhaps, than 
they could have been to any other man living. 
He would not shrink from doing his full duty,, 
however difficult its performance might be. 

It made an old man of him. The night before 
he decided to send provisions to Sumter he slept 
not a wink. That was one of many nights when 
he did not sleep, and there were many mornings 
when he tasted no food. But weak, fasting, 
worn, aging as he was, he was always at his post 
of duty. The most casual observer could see the 
inroads which these mental cares made upon his 
giant body. 

THE MIDDLE PERIOD 

The middle period of the war was gloomy and 
discouraging. Antietam, to be sure, was won 
from Lee by McClellan (September 17, 1862), 
but the fruits of the victory were lost — the Army 
of the Potomac was too much exhausted, it was 
said, for pursuit. For many months the hostile 
armies continued facing each other, and for the 
most part they were much nearer Washington 
than Richmond. 

^Meantime summer, fall, and winter were pass- 
ing by and there was no tangible evidence that 
the Government would ever be able to maintain 
its authority. All this time the Army of the 
Potomac was magnificent in numbers, equipment, 
intelligence. The one thing it needed was lead- 
ership. The South had generals of the first 
grade. The generalship of the North had not 
yet fully developed. 



256 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 



TRYING OUT THE GENERALS 

Lincoln held on to McClellan as long as it was 
possible to do so. He never resented that offi- 
cer's personal discourtesies. He never wearied 
of the fruitless task of urging him on. Except 
among Northern Democrats with Southern sym- 
pathies, who from the first were sure of only 
one thing — that the war was a failure — the clam- 
or for the removal of McClellan was well-nigh 
unanimous. To this clamor Lincoln yielded 
only when it became manifestly foolish longer 
to resist it. 

But who should take McClellan's place? In 
all the armies there was at that time no general 
whose successes were so conspicuous as to point 
him out as the coming man. But there were 
generals who had done and then were doing 
good service. General Ambrose E. Burnside 
was at the height of his achievements. He was 
accordingly appointed to succeed McClellan. 

Burnside's one battle as commander of the 
Army of the Potomac was fought against Lee 
at Fredericksburg, on December 13, 1862, and 
resulted in his being repulsed with terrible 
slaughter. 

The next experiment was with General Joseph 
Tlooker, a valiant and able man, whose warlike 
qualities are indicated by his well-earned sobri- 
quet of ''Fighting Joe," although he had his lim- 
itations. When appointing him to the command 
Lincoln wrote him a personal letter. This letter 
(given elsewhere in the present edition) is a per- 
fect illustration of the kindly patience of the man 
in whom so much patience was required. 

The first effect of this letter was to subdue the 



DEFEATS AND VICTORIES 257 

fractious spirit of the fighter. He said : ''That 
is just such a letter as a father might write to 
a son. It is a beautiful letter, and although I 
think he was harder on me than I deserved, I 
will say that I love the man who wrote it." 

It was in January, 1863, that Hooker took 
command of the Army of the Potomac, with 
Lee for his great opponent. Three months later 
he had it in shape for the campaign, and Lincoln 
went down to see the review. It was indeed a 
magnificent army, an inspiring sight. 

But soon (May 2-4) came Chancellorsville 
with its sickening consequences. When the news 
of Hooker's defeat came to Washington, the 
President, with streaming eyes, could only ex- 
claim : ''My God, my God ! what will the coun- 
try say?" 

Hooker was succeeded in June by General 
George G. Meade, "four-eyed George," as he 
was playfully called by his loyal soldiers, in allu- 
sion to his eye-glasses. Under him, a few days 
later (July 1-3), the great battle of Gettysburg 
was fought, and a most important but dearly 
won victory achieved. But here, as at Antietam, 
the triumph was bitterly marred by the disap- 
pointment that followed. The victorious army 
let the defeated army get away. The excuse 
was much the same as at Antietam — the Federal 
troops were tired out. But it may be assumed 
that the defeated army was also tired. Again was 
lost what appears to have been a golden oppor- 
tunity to destroy Lee's army and end the war. 

Here were three men — Burnside, Hooker, and 
Meade — all good men and gallant soldiers. But 
not one of them was able successfully to com- 
mand so large an army, or to do the thing that 



258 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

appeared to be most needed — to capture Rich- 
mond. The future hero had not yet won the 
attention of the country. 

DARK DAYS 

In the mean time affairs were very dark for 
the Administration. Up to the summer of 1863, 
as we have seen, they had been growing darker 
and darker. Some splendid mihtary success had 
been accomphshed in the West, but in Virginia 
the Confederate army was almost within sight 
of the capital, and the Western victories did not 
have as much influence as they should have had. 

The President did what he could. He had 
thus far held the divided North, and prevented 
a European alliance with the Confederates. He 
now used, one by one, the most extreme meas- 
ures. He suspended the writ of habeas corpus, 
declared or authorized martial law, authorized 
the confiscation of the property of those who 
were giving aid and comfort to the enemy, called 
for troops by conscription when volunteering 
ceased, and enlisted negro troops. Any person 
who studies the character of Abraham Lincoln 
will realize that these measures, or most of them, 
came from him with great reluctance. He was 
not a man who would readily or lightly adopt 
such means. They meant that the country was 
pressed, hard pressed. They were extreme meas- 
ures, not congenial to his accustomed lines of 
thought. They were military necessities. 

But what Lincoln looked for, longed for, was 
the man who could skilfully and successfully use 
the great Army of the Potomac. He had not 
yet been discovered. 



DEFEATS AND VICTORIES 259 



A BREAK IN THE CLOUDS 

Let US return briefly to the battle of Gettys- 
burg. When General Meade accepted the re- 
sponsibility of commanding the Army of the 
Potomac, he did so in a modest and soldierly 
spirit, and he quit himself like a man. When 
Lee invaded Pennsylvania his objective point 
was not known. He might capture Harrisburg 
or Philadelphia, or both. He would probably 
desire to cut off all communication with Wash- 
ington. The only thing to do was to overtake 
him and force a battle. He himself realized this 
and was fully decided not to give battle but fight 
only on the defensive. Curiously enough, Meade 
also decided not to attack, but to fight on the 
defensive. The result was Gettysburg, and the 
battle was not fought in accordance with the 
plan of either commander. Uncontrollable events 
forced the conflict then and there. 



RESULTS AT GETTYSBURG 

The scope of this volume does not permit the 
description of this great battle, and only some 
of the results may be given. The evening of 
July I closed in with the Union army holding 
out, but with the advantages, such as they were, 
on the Confederate side. The second day the 
fight was fiercely renewed and closed with no 
special advantage on either side. On the third 
day it was still undecided till, in the afternoon, 
the climax came in Pickett's famous charge. 
This was made by the very flower of the Con- 
federate army, and the hazard of the charge 
was taken by General Lee against the earnest 



2 6o ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

advice of Longstreet. The brave men who made 
the desperate attempt were repulsed and routed, 
and that decided the battle. Lee's army was 
turned back and the invasion was a failure. 

Gettysburg was the greatest battle ever fought 
in the western hemisphere, and has been ranked 
among the decisive battles of the world. The 
troops numbered between 70,000 and 80,000 on 
each side. When the enemy was in retreat, not 
all that President Lincoln could say availed to 
persuade Meade to renew the attack. When Lee 
reached the Potomac he found the river so swol- 
len as to be impassable. He could only wait 
for the waters to subside or for time to impro- 
vise a pontoon bridge. 

When, after waiting for ten days, Meade was 
finally aroused to make the attack, he was just 
one day too late. Lee had got his army safely 
into Virginia_, and the war was not over. 

FALL OF VICKSBURG 

On the afternoon of July 3, almost at the very 
time that Pickett was making his charge, there 
was in progress, a thousand miles to the south- 
west, an event of almost equal importance to the 
Union cause with the battle of Gettysburg. Just 
outside the fortifications of Vicksburg, under an 
oak-tree. General Grant had met the Confederate 
General Pemberton, to negotiate terms of sur- 
render after protracted operations against the 
place. Vicksburg commanded the Mississippi 
River and was supposed to be impregnable. Few 
cities have been situated more favorably to resist 
either attack or siege. But Admiral Porter got 
his gunboats below the city, running the batteries 



DEFEATS AND VICTORIES 261 

in the night, and Grant's investment was com- 
plete. The enemy's forces were almost starved 
out, and at last they found their condition to be 
hopeless. 

General Grant occupied Vicksburg July 4, and 
the magnanimous conquerors treated its brave 
defenders with all permissible consideration. The 
account by Nicolay and Hay ends with the fol- 
lowing grateful reflection : "It is not the least 
of the glories gained by the Army of the Ten- 
nessee in this wonderful campaign that not a 
single cheer went up from the Union ranks, not 
a single word [was spoken] that could offend 
their beaten foes." 

The sequel to this victory came ten months 
later in Sherman's march to the sea, not less 
thrilling in its conception and dramatic in its 
execution than any battle or siege. Much fight- 
ing skilful generalship, long patience were re- 
quired before this crowning act could be accom- 
plished, but it came in due time and was one of 
the finishing blows to the Confederacy. It came 
as a logical result of the fall of Vicksburg. 

After the Gettysburg and Vicksburg triumphs, 
the feeling was general throughout the North 
that we were now on the way to a successful 
issue of the war. The end was almost in sight. 

THANKSGIVING 

On July 15, 1863, the President issued a 
proclamation, designating August 6 as a day of 
thanksgiving. Later in the year he issued an- 
other thanksgiving proclamation, designating the 
last Thursday in November. Previous to that 
time, certain States, and not a few individuals. 



262 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

were in the habit of observing a thanksgiving day 
in November. Indeed, the custom, in a desultory 
way, dates back to Plymouth Colony. But these 
irregular and uncertain observances never took 
on the semblance of a national holiday. The 
national Thanksgiving dates from the proclama- 
tion issued October 3, 1863. From that day to 
this, every President has every year followed 
that example. 

It is now plain that after July 4, 1863, the 
final result of the Civil War was no longer doubt- 
ful. So Lincoln felt. There were indeed some 
who continued to cry that the war was a failure, 
but in such cases the wish may have been father 
to the thought. 

LIEUTENANT-GENERAL GRANT 

Besides, the commander for whom the Presi- 
dent and the country had been so long and anx- 
iously looking was gradually revealing himself, 
and was at length to assume his place at the head 
of victorious Federal armies. General Grant, 
who had done excellent work before he took 
Vicksburg, continued his successful activities. 
After the fall of Vicksburg he was placed in 
command of the Military Division of the Mis- 
sissippi, and with able subordinates he conducted 
the operations that resulted in the final defeat 
of General Bragg at Chattanooga. Grant was 
made Lieutenant-General, and in March, 1864, 
he took command of the armies of the United 
States, thereafter having his headquarters with 
the Army of the Potomac, which at last he was 
to lead to victory. 



CHAPTER XXIV 
The Emancipator 

The institution of slavery was hateful to the 
humane and liberty-loving nature of Lincoln. 
But he knew that slavery was tolerated by the 
Constitution, and by special laws enacted within 
its provisions, though he believed that the later 
expansion of the system was contrary to the spirit 
and intent of the men who framed the Consti- 
tution. He believed that slaveholders had legal 
rights which should be respected by all orderly 
citizens. His sympathy with the slave did not 
cripple his consideration for the slaveholder who 
had inherited property in that form, and under 
a constitution and laws which he did not orig- 
inate and for which he was not responsible. 

Lincoln would destroy slavery root and branch, 
but he would do it in a.manner conformable to 
the Constitution, not in violation of it. He would 
exterminate it, but he would not so do it as to 
impoverish law-abiding citizens whose property 
was in slaves. He would eliminate slavery, but 
not in a way to destroy the country, for that 
would entail more mischief than benefit. To use 
a figure, he would throw Jonah overboard, but 
he would not upset the ship in the act. 

REASONS FOR DELAY 

In the early part of the war there were cer- 
tain attempts at emancipation which Lincoln held 



264 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

in check for the reason that the time for them 
had not arrived. Were the Union destroyed, it 
would be the death-blow to the cause of eman- 
cipation. At the same time not a few slavehold- 
ers were loyal men. To alienate these by pre- 
mature action would be disastrous. The only 
wise plan was to wait patiently till a sufficient 
number of these could be depended on in the 
emergency of emancipation. This was what 
Lincoln was doing. 

To the loyal slaveholders of the border States 
he made a proposal of compensated emancipation 
which, to his great disappointment, they rejected. 
In view of this unwise course, he cautioned them 
that worse troubles for them might follow. 

All this time, while holding back the eager 
spirits of the abolitionists, he was preparing for 
his final stroke. But it was of capital impor- 
tance that this should not be premature. Mc- 
Clellan's failure to take Richmond, and his per- 
sistent delay, hastened the result. The Northern 
people became more and more impatient. They 
felt that something radical must be done, and 
that quickly. But it was still necessary that Lin- 
coln should be patient. As the bravest fireman 
is the last to leave the burning structure, so the 
wise statesman must hold himself in check until 
the success of an important measure is assured 
beyond a doubt. 

QUESTION BEFORE THE CABINET 

As the dreadful summer of 1862 advanced, 
Lincoln noted surely that the time was at hand 
when emancipation would be the master stroke. 
In discussing the possibilities of this measure he 



THE EMANCIPATOR 265 

seemed to take the opposite side. This was a 
fixed habit with him. He drew out the thoughts 
of other people. He was enabled to see the sub- 
ject from all sides. Even after his mind was 
made up to do a certain thing, he would still 
argue against it. But in any other sense than 
this he took counsel of no one upon the emanci- 
pation measure. The work was his work. He 
presented his tentative proclamation to the Cab- 
inet on July 22, 1862. The story of this con- 
ference is best told in Lincoln's words, as given 
by F. B. Carpenter in his Six Months in the 
White House. 



LINCOLN S OWN STORY ABOUT THE EMANCIPATION 
PROCLAMATION 

'Tt had got to be midsummer, 1862. Things 
had gone on from bad to worse, until I felt that 
we had reached the end of our rope on the plan 
of operations we had been pursuing ; that we had 
about played our last card, and must change our 
tactics or lose the game! 

'T now determined upon the adoption of the 
emancipation policy ; and, without consultation 
with or knowledge of the Cabinet, I prepared 
the original draft of the proclamation, and, after 
much anxious thought, called a Cabinet meeting 
upon the subject. This was the last of July or 
the first part of August, 1862. . . . This Cabinet 
meeting took place, I think, on a Saturday. All 
were present excepting Mr. Blair, the Postmas- 
ter-General, who . . . came in subsequently. 

'T said to the Cabinet that I had resolved upon 
this step, and had not called them together to 
ask their advice, but to lay the subject-matter 



266 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

of a proclamation before them ; suggestions . . . 
would be in order, after they had heard it read. 
. . . Various suggestions were offered. Secre- 
tary Chase wished the language stronger in ref- 
erence to the arming of the blacks. Mr. Blair, 
after he came in^ deprecated the policy, on the 
ground that it would cost the Administration the 
fall elections. Nothing, however, was offered 
that I had not fully anticipated and settled in 
my own mind, until Secretary Seward spoke. He 
said in substance : 

" 'Mr. President, I approve of the proclama- 
tion, but I question the expediency of its issue 
at this juncture. The depression of the public 
mind, consequent upon our repeated reverses, is 
so great that I fear the effect of so important 
a step. It may be viewed as the last measure 
of an exhausted Government^ a cry for help ; the 
Government stretching forth its hands to Ethio- 
pia, instead of Ethiopia stretching forth her hands 
to the Government.' His idea," said the Presi- 
dent, "was that it would be considered our last 
shriek, on the retreat. 

" 'Now,' continued Mr. Seward, 'while I ap- 
prove the measure, I suggest, sir, that you post- 
pone its issue, until you can give it to the coun- 
try supported by military success, instead of 
issuing it, as it would be now, upon the greatest 
disasters of the war !' " 

Mr. Lincoln continued: "The wisdom of the 
views of the Secretary of State struck me with 
very great force. It was an aspect of the case 
that, in all my thought upon the subject, I had 
entirely overlooked. The result was that I put 
the draft of the proclamation aside, as you do 
your sketch for a picture, waiting for a victory. 



THE EMANCIPATOR 267 

From time to time I added or changed a line, 
touching it up here and there, anxiously watch- 
ing the progress of events. 

''Well, the next news we had was of Pope's 
disaster at Bull Run [second Battle of Bull Run, 
August 30, 1862]. Things looked darker than 
ever. Finally, came the week of the battle of 
Antietam. I determined to wait no longer. The 
news came, I think, on Wednesday, that the ad- 
vantage was on our side. I was then staying at 
the Soldiers' Home. Here I finished writing the 
second draft of the preliminary proclamation ; 
came up on Saturday ; called the Cabinet together 
to hear it^ and it was published the following 
Monday." 

Seward's amendment 

At the final meeting of September 20 another 
interesting incident occurred in connection with 
Secretary Seward. The President had written 
the important part of the proclamation in these 
words : 

'That, on the first day of January, in the year 
of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and 
sixty-three, all persons held as slaves within any 
State or designated part of a State, the people 
whereof shall then be in rebellion against the 
United States, shall be then, thenceforward, and 
forever free; and the Executive Government of 
the United States, including the military and 
naval authority thereof, will recognize the free- 
dom of such persons, and will do no act or acts 
to repress such persons, or any of them, in 
any efforts they may make for their actual free- 
dom." 

"When I finished reading this paragraph," re- 



268 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

sumed Mr. Lincoln, "Mr. Seward stopped me 
and said, *I think, Mr. President, that you should 
insert after the word ''recognise," in that sen- 
tence, the words "and maintain.'' ' I replied that 
I had already fully considered the import of that 
expression, in this connection, but I had not in- 
troduced it, because it was not my way to 
promise what I was not entirely sure that I 
could perform, and I was not prepared to say 
that I thought we were exactly able to main- 
tain this. 

"But," said he, "Seward insisted that we ought 
to take this ground ; and the words finally went 
in!" 

SIGNING THE EMANCIPATION PROCLAMATION 

The roll containing the Emancipation Procla- 
mation was taken to Mr. Lincoln at noon on the 
first day of January, 1863, by Secretary Seward 
and his son Frederick. As it lay unrolled be- 
fore him, Mr. Lincoln took a pen, dipped it in 
the ink, moved his hand to the place for the 
signature, held it a moment, then removed his 
hand and dropped the pen. After a little hesi- 
tation he again took up the pen and went through 
the same movement as before. Mr. Lincoln then 
turned to Mr. Seward and said: 

"I have been shaking hands since nine o'clock 
this morning, and my right arm is almost para- 
lyzed. If my name ever goes into history it will 
be for this act, and my whole soul is in it. If 
my hand trembles when I sign the Proclamation, 
all who examine the document hereafter will say, 
'He hesitated.' " 

He then turned to the table, took up the pen 
again, and slowly, firmly, wrote Abraham Lin- 



THE EMANCIPATOR 269 

coin, with which the whole world is now familiar. 
He then looked up, smiled, and said : 
'That will do!" 



VIA CHICAGO 

He was just as ready to answer, instanter, the 
affirmation of his opponents as he was to present 
and vindicate his own. This striking peculiarity 
of Mr. Lincoln's mental operations throws a 
flood of light upon the searching questions he 
propounded to the Chicago ministers who called 
on him, in September, 1862, to demand of him 
a proclamation of emancipation. After listening 
to their appeal, he replied, pointedly : 

''Now, gentlemen, if I cannot enforce the Con- 
stitution down South, how am I to enforce a 
mere Presidential proclamation? Won't the 
world sneer at it as being as powerless as the 
Pope's bull against the comet?" and they went 
away sorrowing^ in the erroneous belief that he 
had decided the case adversely. 

One of these ministers felt it his duty to make 
a more searching appeal to the President's con- 
science. Just as they were retiring, he turned 
and said to Mr. Lincoln : 

"What you have said to us, Mr. President, 
compels me to say to you in reply, that it is a 
message to you from our Divine Master, through 
me, commanding you, sir, to open the doors of 
bondage that the slave may go free!" 

Mr. Lincoln replied, instantly: "That may be, 
sir, for I have studied this question, by night 
and by day, for weeks and for months ; but if it 
is, as you say, a message from your Divine Mas- 
ter, is it not odd that the only channel he could 



270 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

send it by was the roundabout route by way of 
that awful wicked city of Chicago?" 

what's in a name? 

President Lincoln replied to a deputation, one 
of many who called to urge immediate emanci- 
pation when the proposition was not yet framed 
as a bill : 

''If I issue a proclamation now, as you sug- 
gest, it will be . . . ineffectual. ... It cannot 
be forced. Now, by way of illustration, how 
many legs will a sheep have if you call his tail 
a leg?" 

They all answered: ''Five." 

"You are mistaken/' said Lincoln, "for calHng 
a tail a leg does not make it one." 



I 



CHAPTER XXV 

Reelection : End of the War 

It was Lincoln's life-long habit to keep him- 
self close to the "plain people." He loved them. 
He declared that the Lord must love them or he 
would not have made so many of them. He had 
a profound realization of their importance to the 
national prosperity. It was their instincts that 
formed the national conscience. Their votes had 
elected him ; their arms had defended the capi- 
tal ; on their loyalty he counted for the ultimate 
triumph of the Union cause. As his adminis- 
trative policy progressed it was his concern not 
to outstrip them so far as to lose their support. 
In other words, he was to lead them, not run 
away from them. 

UNION AND SLAVERY 

Lincoln, shrewdly and fairly, analyzed the 
factions of loyal people as follows : *'We are in 
civil war. In such cases there always is a main 
question; but in this case that question is a per- 
plexing compound — Union and slavery. It thus 
becomes a question not of two sides merely, but 
of at least four sides, even among those who are 
for the Union, saying nothing of those who are 
against it. Thus — 

"Those who are for the Union with, but not 
without, slavery; 

"Those for it without, but not with ; 



272 ^ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

"Those for it with or without, but prefer it 
with ; and 

"Those for it with or without, but prefer it 
without. 

"Among these again is a subdivision of those 
who are for gradual, but not for immediate, and 
those who are for immediate, but not for gradual, 
extinction of slavery." 



OPPOSITION TO THE PRESIDENT 

One man who was in the political schemes of 
that day says that in Washington there were 
only three prominent politicians who were not 
seriously discontented with and opposed to Lin- 
coln. The three named were Conkling, Sumner, 
and Wilson. Though there was undoubtedly a 
larger number who remained loyal to their chief, 
yet the discontent was general. The President 
himself felt this. Nicolay and Hay have pub- 
lished a note which impressively tells the sorrow- 
ful story: 

"Executive Mansion, 
"Washington, August 23, 1864, 
"This morning, as for some days past, it seems 
exceedingly probable that this Administration 
will not be reelected. Then it will be my duty to 
so cooperate with the President elect as to save 
the Union between the election and the inaugura- 
tion, as he will have secured his election on such 
ground that he cannot possibly save it afterward. 

"A. Lincoln." 

Early in the year the discontent had broken 
out in a disagreeable and dangerous form. The 



REELECTION: END OF THE WAR 273 

malcontents were casting about to find a candi- 
date who would defeat Lincoln. 



UNANIMOUS RENOMINATION 

The Republican national convention assembled 
in Baltimore, June 7, 1864. Lincoln's name was 
presented, as in i860, by the State of Illinois. 
On the first ballot he received every vote except 
those from Missouri. Then the Missouri dele- 
gates changed their votes and he was nominated 
unanimously. 

*'not best to swap horses" 

Li reply to congratulations, he said, *T do not 
allow myself to suppose that either the conven- 
tion or the [National Union] League have con- 
cluded to decide that I am either the greatest or 
best man in America, but rather that they have 
concluded that it is not best to swap horses while 
crossing the river, and have further concluded 
that I am not so poor a horse that they might 
not make a botch of it trying to swap." 

That homely figure of "swapping horses while 
crossing the river" caught the attention of the 
country. It is doubtful if ever a campaign 
speech, or any series of campaign speeches, was 
so effective in winning and holding votes as that 
one phrase. 

WAR GOVERNORS 

But the prospects during the summer — for 
there was a period of five months from the nomi- 
nation to the election — were anything but cheer- 
ing. At this crisis there developed a means of 



274 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

vigorous support which had not previously been 
estimated at its full value. In every loyal State 
there was a "war Governor," though a certain 
group bore this title by preeminence. Upon 
these executives the burdens of the war had 
rested so heavily that they understood, as they 
could not otherwise have done, the superlative 
weight of cares that pressed on the President, 
and they saw more clearly than they otherwise 
could have seen, the danger in swapping horses 
while crossing the river. These Governors ral- 
lied with unanimity to sustain the President. 
And the "plain people," as well as the leading 
patriots, were roused to support him. 

LINCOLN REELECTED 

The Democrats nominated McClellan on the 
general theory that the war was a failure. As 
election day approached, the increased vigor with 
which the war was prosecuted made it look less 
like a failure, even though final success was not 
in sight. The result of the election was what in 
later days would be called a landslide. There 
were 233 electors. Of this number 212 were 
for Lincoln. The loyal North was back of him. 
He might now confidently gird himself for fin- 
ishing the work. 

Such was his kindliness of spirit that he was 
not unduly elated by success, and never, either in 
trial or achievement, did he become vindictive or 
revengeful. After the election he was serenaded, 
ani in acknowledgment he made a little speech. 
Among other things he said, "Now that the 
election is over, may not all, having a common 
interest, reunite in a common effort to save our 



i 



REELECTION : END OF THE WAR 275 

common country? For my own part, I have 
striven, and will strive, to place no obstacle in 
the way. So long as I have been here / have not 
willingly planted a thorn in any man's bosom/' 

THE WAR NEARLY OVER 

As the year 1864 neared its close, military 
events manifestly approached a climax. In 1861 
the armies of both North and South were mainly 
composed of raw troops. But both sides now 
had armies of seasoned veterans ; the generals 
had been thoroughly tried, and their abilities 
were known. 

The North now also had a strong navy. The 
Mississippi River was open from Minnesota to 
the Gulf of Mexico. Every Southern port was 
more or less closely blockaded, and the Federal 
Government was daily increasing its advantages. 
The financial problem was perhaps the most 
serious of all, but in this respect the South was 
suffering more than the North. In fact, on the 
Southern side matters were growing desperate. 
The factor of time now counted against the 
South, for except in military discipline its 
chances had not improved during the progress 
of the war. There was little hope either of for- 
eign intervention or of effectual reaction in the 
North. 

In August, 1864, Admiral Farragut stopped 
blockade-running at Mobile, captured the Con- 
federate ironclad Tennessee, and compelled the 
surrender of Forts Gaines and Morgan and 
other defences of Mobile Bay. General Grant 
with his veterans was face to face with General 
Lee and his veterans in Virginia. General Sher- 



276 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

man, with his splendid army, in the fall struck 
through the territory of the Southern Confed- 
eracy, and on December 21 he captured Savan- 
nah — his "Christmas gift" to the President and 
the Union. 

The principal thing now to be done was the 
destruction of the Confederate forces in Vir- 
ginia. That and that only could end the war. 
The sooner it should be done the better. Grant's 
spirit cannot in a hundred pages be better ex- 
pressed than in his well-known declaration, 'T 
propose to fight it out on this line if it takes all 
summer." It did take all summer and all win- 
ter too, for the Confederates as well as the Fed- 
erals had continued to be good fighters. 

"let DAVIS go" 

As the end came in sight, an awkward ques- 
tion arose: What shall we do with Jefferson 
Davis — if we catch him? This reminded the 
President of a little story. 'T told Grant," he 
said, "the story of an Irishman who had taken 
Father Mathew's pledge. Soon thereafter, be- 
coming very thirsty, he slipped into a saloon and 
applied for a lemonade, and while it was being 
mixed he whispered to the bar-tender, 'Av ye 
could drap a bit o' brandy in it, all unbeknown 
to meself, I'd make no fuss about it.' My notion 
was that if Grant could let Jeff Davis escape all 
unbeknown to himself, he was to let him go. I 
didn't want him." Subsequent events proved the 
sterling wisdom of this suggestion, for the coun- 
try had no use for Davis when he was caught. 



REELECTION: END OF THE WAR 277 



SURRENDER OF LEE 

Late in March, 1865, the President decided to 
take a short vacation, said to be the first he had 
had since entering the White House in 1861. 
With a few friends he went to City Point on the 
James River, where Grant had his headquarters. 
General Sherman came up for a conference. The 
two generals were confident that the end of the 
war was near, but they were also certain that 
there must be at least one more great battle. 
**Avoid this if possible," said the President. 
*'No more bloodshed, no more bloodshed." 

On the second day of April both Richmond and 
Petersburg were evacuated. On the 9th Lee sur- 
rendered at Appomattox Court House. The 
President was determined to see Richmond, and 
started for the city under the care of Admiral 
Porter. 

THE PRESIDENT IN RICHMOND 

The grandeur of the triumphal entry of the 
President and his party into Richmond was en- 
tirely moral, not in the least spectacular. There 
were no triumphal arches, no martial music, no 
applauding multitudes, no vast cohorts with fly- 
ing banners and glittering arms. Only a few^ 
American citizens, in plain clothes, on foot, es- 
corted by ten marines. The central figure was 
that of a man remarkably tall, homely, ill- 
dressed, but with a countenance radiating joy 
and good will. It was only thirty-six hours 
since Jefferson Davis had fled, and the Confed- 
erates had set fire to the city, which was still 
burning. 



2 78 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 



THE FLAG ON SUMTER I THE WAR OVER 

Johnston did not surrender to Sherman until 
April 26, when Lee's surrender necessitated his. 
It was now seen that it was a matter of but a 
few days when the rest also would surrender. 
On Good Friday, April 14 — a day glorious in 
its beginning, tragic at its close — the newspapers 
throughout the North published an order of the 
Secretary of War stopping the draft and the 
purchase of arms and munitions of war. The 
Government had decreed that at twelve o'clock 
noon of that day the stars and stripes should be 
raised above Fort Sumter. The orator of the 
occasion was the eloquent Henry Ward Beecher. 
And the flag was raised by Major (now General) 
Anderson, whose staunch loyalty and heroic de- 
fence linked his name inseparably with that of 
Fort Sumter. 

The war was over and Lincoln at once turned 
his attention to the duties of reconstruction. 



THE QUIET-MINDED MAN 

About midnight on the day of the election in 
1864, it was certain that Lincoln had been re- 
elected, and the few gentlemen left in the War 
Office congratulated him very warmly on the 
result. Lincoln took the matter very calmly, 
showing not the least elation or excitement, but 
said that he would admit that he was glad to be 
relieved of all suspense, and that he was grateful 
that the verdict of the people was likely to be 
so full, clear, and unmistakable that there could 
be no dispute. 

About two o'clock in the morning a messenger 



REELECTION : END OF THE WAR 279 

came over to the War Office from the White 
House with the news that a crowd of Pennsyl- 
vanians were serenading his empty chamber, 
whereupon he went home, and in answer to re- 
peated calls he made a happy little speech full 
of good feeling and cheerfulness. He wound 
up his remarks by saying: 

"H I know my heart, my gratitude is free from 
any taint of personal triumph. I do not impugn 
the motives of any one opposed to me. It is no 
pleasure to me to triumph over any one, but I 
give thanks to the Almighty for this evidence of 
the people's resolution to stand by free govern- 
ment and the rights of humanity." 

THE president's HAPPIEST DAY 

Lincoln, says James M. Scovel, "had a "spirit 
touched to fine issues,' and felt keenly and in- 
tensely the woes of others. During the spring 
following Curtin's reelection as Governor of 
Pennsylvania, I found the President, fresh as 
a May morning, looking out of the east window 
of the White House, on the fragrant, opening 
bloom of the lilac-bushes beneath his window. 
Only that day he had received the assurance that 
the spirit of nationality had proved stronger than 
the power of faction, and was fully informed that 
Chase, Ben Wade, and 'Pathfinder' Fremont 
were all out of the Presidential race, and his 
nomination before the June convention to be held 
at Baltimore would be practically unanimous. 
As I entered the room, he rose and pushed a 
chair, with his feet, across the room, close to his 
own. There was a suspicious moisture in his 
eyes as he grasped both of my hands in both of 



28o ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

his own (a habit of Mr. Lincoln's when greatly 
moved by joy or sorrow). 

" *God bless you, young man/ he exclaimed. 
*How glad I am you came ! This is the happiest 
day of my life ; for I no longer doubt the prac- 
tical unanimity of the people, who are willing I 
should have the chance to finish the big job I 
undertook nearly four years ago.' " 



CHAPTER XXVI 

Death of Lincoln: the Nation's Sorrow 

Between Springfield and Washington, as Lin- 
coln made that memorable journey to his first 
inauguration, there were at least three known 
attempts upon his life, and when we consider the 
number and bitterness of his enemies, and the 
desperate character of some of them, the won- 
der is that he was not assassinated long before 
1865. There were multitudes of ruffians in 
Washington and elsewhere, who had murder in 
their hearts and deadly weapons within easy 
reach. He lived and toiled in danger for four 
years, and was reluctant to accept even a nomi- 
nal body-guard. The striking parallel between 
him and William the Silent will occur to the 
reader. He, like Lincoln, would take no pre- 
caution. He exposed himself freely, and there 
were plots almost innumerable against his life 
before he was slain. Such persons seem to have 
invisible defenders. 



A PRESAGEFUL DREAM 

Lincoln shared the impressibility of the com- 
munity in which he grew up. Being unusually 
outspoken, he often told of impressions which 
another would not have mentioned. Various ac- 
counts have been given of premonitions that 
came to him of his tragic death, and not long 
before that event he told of a dream he had had 



282 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

a few nights since, in which he saw his end ter- 
ribly prefigured. "I slept no more that night," 
he said ; "and although it was only a dream, I 
have been strangely annoyed by it ever since." 

THE FATAL DAY 

In spite of all, he was in excellent spirits on 
Good Friday, April 14, 1865. The burdens and 
sorrows of bloodshed had made an old man of 
him. But the war was at an end, the Stars and 
Stripes were floating over Sumter, the Union was 
saved, and slavery was doomed. There came 
back into his eyes the light that had long been 
absent. Those who were about him said the 
elasticity of his movements and joyousness of 
his manner were marked. *'His mood all day 
was singularly happy and tender." 

The events of the day were simple. It was 
the day of the regular meeting of the Cabinet. 
Grant, who had arrived in Washington that 
morning, attended this meeting. It was the 
President's idea that the leaders of the Con- 
federacy should be allowed to escape — much as 
he had already jocularly advised Grant to let 
Jeff Davis escape ''all unbeknown to himself." 
He spoke plainly on the subject. ''No one need 
expect me to take any part in hanging or killing 
these men, even the worst of them. Enough 
lives have been sacrificed." After the discussion 
of various matters, when the Cabinet adjourned 
till the following Tuesday, the last words he ever 
uttered to them were that "they must now begin 
to act in the interests of peace." 

For the evening of that Friday Mrs. Lincoln 
had got up a theatre party — the President was 



DEATH OF LINCOLN' 283 

always fond of the diversion of the theatre. The 
party was to include General and Mrs. Grant. 
But the General's plans required him to go that 
evening to Philadelphia, and so Major Rathbone 
and Miss Harris were substituted. This party 
went to Ford's Theatre, and occupied the upper 
proscenium box on the right of the stage. 

THE ASSASSIN 

About ten o'clock, John Wilkes Booth, an 
actor about twenty-six years of age, belonging 
to a family of famous players, glided along the 
corridor toward that box. Being well known 
by the employees of the theatre, he was suffered 
to proceed without hindrance. Passing through 
the corridor door he fastened it shut by means of 
a bar that fitted into a niche previously prepared, 
and making an effectual barricade. A hole had 
been bored through the door leading into the box 
so that he could survey the inmates without at- 
tracting their attention. With a pistol in one 
hand and a dagger in the other he noiselessly 
entered the box and stood directly behind the 
President who was enjoying the humor of the 
comedy. 

AWFULNESS OF THE TRAGEDY 

"The awful tragedy in the box," say NIcolay 
and Hay, "makes everything else seem pale and 
unreal. Here were five human beings in a nar- 
row space — the greatest man of his time, In the 
glory of the most stupendous success In our his- 
tory, the Idolized chief of a nation already 
mighty, with illimitable vistas of grandeur to 
come; his beloved wife, proud and happy; a pair 



284 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

of betrothed lovers, with all the promise of fe- 
licity that youth, social position, and wealth 
could give them ; and this young actor, hand- 
some as Endymion upon Latmos, the pet of his 
little world. The glitter of fame, happiness, and 
ease was upon the entire group, but in an instant 
everything was to be changed with the blinding 
swiftness of enchantment. Quick death was to 
come on the central figure of that company — the 
central figure, we believe, of the great and good 
men of the century. Over all the rest the black- 
est fates hovered menacingly — fates from which 
a mother might pray that kindly death would 
save her children in their infancy. One was to 
wander with the stain of murder on his soul, 
with the curses of a world upon his name, with 
a price set upon his head, in frightful physical 
pain, till he died a dog's death in a burning barn ; 
the stricken wife was to pass the rest of her 
days in melancholy and madness; of those two 
young lovers, one was to slay the other, and 
then end his life a raving maniac." 

THE PRESIDENT SHOT: HIS MURDERER KILLED 

Booth's pistol was thrust near to the back of 
the head of the unsuspecting victim — that kind 
man who had *'never willingly planted a thorn 
in any man's bosom," who could not bear to 
witness suifering even in an animal. The report 
of the pistol was somewhat muffled and was un- 
noticed by the majority of the audience. The 
ball penetrated the President's brain ; he uttered 
no word or sound; "his head drooped forward 
slightly, his eyes closed." Major Rathbone took 
in the situation and sprang at the murderer, who 



DEATH OF LINCOLN 285 

slashed him savagely with the dagger, tore him- 
self free, and leaped over the balustrade upon 
the stage. It was not a high leap for an athletic 
young man, but his spur caught in a flag with 
which the box was draped, so that he did not 
strike quite squarely on his feet. The result was 
that he broke his leg. But, gathering himself up, 
he flourished his dagger, declaiming the motto of 
Virginia Sic semper tyrannis (Thus ever to ty- 
rants), and before the audience could realize 
what was done, he disappeared. He ran out of 
the rear of the theatre where a fleet horse was 
in waiting. He mounted and rode for his life. 
For eleven days he was in hiding, suffering all 
the while agonies from his broken leg, which 
could be but imperfectly cared for. He was 
finally cornered in a barn, the barn was set on 
fire, and while thus at bay he was shot down. 

ABRAHAM LINCOLN DEAD 

Aid came at once to the President, but the 
surgeons saw at a glance that the wound was 
mortal. Mr. Lincoln was carried to a small 
house across the street and laid upon a bed in 
a little room at the rear of the hall on the ground 
floor. ''The door was guarded, and none ad- 
mitted but the friends. Most of the Cabinet 
officers had reached there as soon as the inani- 
mate form of the President. The Surgeon-Gen- 
eral of the army had also come, and he was 
making a thorough examination of the wound. 
jAt length, looking into the anxious faces that 
'sought his, he said to Stanton, T fear there is 
no hope.' The Secretary of War exclaimed in 
Itones of anguish, 'No ! no ! General ! oh, no T 



286 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

while convulsive sobs shook his burly frame. 
Senator Sumner sat on the bed, holding one of 
the dying man's hands and crying bitterly." ''As 
the dawn came," says John G. Nicolay, "and the 
lamplight grew pale, his pulse began to fail ; but 
his face, even then, was scarcely more haggard 
than those of the sorrowing men around him. 
His automatic moaning ceased, a look of un- 
speakable peace came upon his worn features, 
and at twenty-two minutes after seven he died. 
Stanton broke the silence by saying: 'Now he be- 
longs to the ages.' " 

THE president's LAST DAY 

After the Cabinet meeting on April 14, the 
President went to drive with Mrs. Lincoln, ex- 
pressing a wish that no one should accompany 
them, and evidently desiring to converse alone 
with her. "Mary," said he, "we have had a hard 
time of it since we came to Washington, but the 
war is over, and with God's blessing we may 
hope for four years of peace and happiness, and 
then we will go back to Illinois and pass the rest 
of our lives in quiet." 

He spoke of his old Springfield home, and 
recollections of his early clays, his little brown 
cottage, the law office, the court-room, the green . 
bag for his briefs and law papers, his adventures 
when riding on the circuit, came thronging back 
to him. The tension under which he had so long 
been kept was removed and he was like a boy 
out of school. 

"We have laid by," said he to his wife, "some 
money, and during this term we will try and 
save up more, but shall not have enough to sup- 



DEATH OF LINCOLN 287 

port us. We will go back to Illinois, and I will 
open a law office at Springfield or Chicago, and 
practise law, and at least do enough to help give 
us a livelihood." 

Such were the dreams, the day-dreams of Lin- 
coln, the last day of his life. In imagination he 
was again in his prairie home, among his law 
books, and in the courts with his old friends. 

Mrs. Lincoln noticed that the President, dur- 
ing this afternoon drive was in unusually good 
spirits, and remarked to him that he was in a like 
mood just before the fatal illness of their son 
Willie. But no kindly premonition warned her 
of the particular danger to be avoided. In the 
joyous excitement of the time even the devotee 
seemed to forget the wonted associations of 
Good Friday. 

FINAL ACTS OF MERCY 

During the afternoon the President signed a 
pardon for a soldier sentenced to be shot for 
desertion, remarking as he did so: 

''Well, I think the boy can do us more good 
above ground than under ground." 

He also approved an application for the dis- 
charge, on taking the oath of allegiance, of a 
Confederate prisoner, on whose petition he 
wrote : 

"Let it be done." 



LETTING THE ELEPHANT ESCAPE 

''On the afternoon of April 14," says Dana, 
"I got a telegram from the Provost Marshal in 
Portland, Me., saying: 'I have positive informa- 
tion that Jacob Thompson will pass through 



288 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

Portland to-night, in order to take a steamer for 
England. What are your orders?' 

''Jacob Thompson, of Mississippi, had been 
Secretary of the Interior in President Buchanan's 
administration. He was a conspicuous secession- 
ist, and for some time had been employed in 
Canada as a semi-diplomatic agent of the Con- 
federate Government. He had been organizing 
all sorts of trouble and getting up raids, of which 
the notorious attack on St. Albans, Vt., was a 
specimen. I took the telegram and went down 
and read it to Mr. Stanton. His order was 
prompt: 'Arrest him!' But as I was going out 
of the door he called to me and said: 'No, wait; 
better go over and see the President.' 

"At the White House all the work of the day 
was over, and I went into the President's busi- 
ness room without meeting any one. Opening 
the door, there seemed to be no one there, but, 
as I was turning to go out, Mr. Lincoln called 
to me from a little side room, where he was 
washing his hands. 

" 'Hallo, Dana !' said he. 'What is it ? What's 
up?' 

"Then I read him the telegram from Portland. 

" 'What does Stanton say ?' he asked. 

" 'He says arrest him, but that I should refer 
the question to you.' 

" 'Well,' said the President slowly, wiping his 
hands, 'no, I rather think not. When you've got 
an elephant by the hind leg, and he's trying to 
run away, it's best to let him run.' " 



DEATH OF LINCOLN 289 



THE MOURNING NATION 

On Friday evening there had been general re- 
joicing throughout the North. On Saturday 
morning there rose to heaven a great cry of dis- 
tress. For the telegraph had carried the heavy 
news to every city and commercial centre. The 
shock plunged the whole community, in the 
twinkling of an eye, from the heights of exulta- 
tion into the abyss of grief. 

Little business was done that day. Offices, 
stores, exchanges were deserted. Men gathered 
in knots and conversed in low tones. By noon 
there was scarcely a public building, store, or 
residence in any Northern city that was not 
draped in mourning. The poorer classes pro- 
cured bits of black crape or the like and tied 
them to their door-knobs. The plain people were 
orphaned. ''Father Abraham" was dead. 

Here and there some Southern sympathizer 
ventured to express exultation — a very rash 
thing to do. Forbearance had ceased to be a 
virtue, and in nearly every such case the crowd 
threatened a lynching and the offender was 
thankful to escape alive. 

Though this wave of sorrow swept over the 
land from ocean to ocean, it was naturally more 
manifest in Washington than elsewhere. There 
the crime had been committed. There the Presi- 
dent's figure was a familiar sight and his voice 
was a familiar sound. There the tragedy was 
more vivid. In the middle of the morning a 
squad of soldiers bore the lifeless body to the 
White House. It lay there in state until the day 
of the funeral, Wednesday. It is safe to say that 
on the intervening Sunday there was hardly a 



2 90 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

pulpit in the North from which, by sermon and 
prayer, were not expressed the love of the chief. 
On Wednesday, the day of the funeral in Wash- 
ington, all the churches in the land were invited 
to join in solemnizing the occasion. 

THE FUNERAL 

The funeral service was held in the East room 
of the White House, conducted by the President's 
pastor, Dr. Gurley, and his eloquent friend, 
Bishop Simpson, of the Methodist Episcopal 
Church. Mrs. Lincoln, prostrated by the shock, 
was unable to be present, and little Tad would 
not come. Only Robert, a recent graduate of 
Harvard and at the time a member of Grant's 
staff, was there to represent the family. 

After the service, which was brief and simple, 
the body was reverently borne, with a military 
cortege, to the Capitol, where it was placed in 
the rotunda till the evening of the next day. 
There, as at the White House, vast multitudes 
passed to look upon that grave, sad, kindly face. 
The negroes came in great numbers, sobbing out 
their grief over the death of their emancipator. 
The soldiers, who remembered so well his "God 
bless you, boys !" manifested equal sorrow. 
There also were neighbors, friends, and the gen- 
eral public, mingling in the assemblage of 
mourners. 

THROUGH CITIES AND STATES 

It was arranged that the cortege should jour- 
ney to Springfield as nearly as possible over the 
same route, reversed, as that taken by the Presi- 
dent to Washington in 1861 — Baltimore, Harris- 



DEATH OF LINCOLN 291 

burg, Philadelphia, New York, Albany, Cleve- 
land, Columbus, Indianapolis, and Chicago. In 
the party there were three of those who had es- 
corted him to Washington — David Davis, W. H. 
Lamon, and General Hunter. 

At eight o'clock on Friday, April 21, the funer- 
al train left Washington. It is hardly too much 
to say that it was a funeral procession two 
thousand miles in length. All along the route 
people turned out, not daunted by darkness and 
rain — for it rained much of the time — and stood 
with streaming eyes to watch the train go by. 
At the larger cities named, the procession paused 
and the body lay for some hours in state while 
the people came in crowds so great that it seemed 
as if they included the whole community. At 
Columbus and Indianapolis those in charge said 
that it seemed as if the entire population of the 
State came to do him honor. 

Naturally the ceremonies were most elaborate 
in New York city. But at Chicago the grief 
was most unrestrained and touching. He was 
there among his neighbors and friends. It was 
the State of Illinois that had given him to the 
nation and the world. Her people had the claim 
of fellow-citizenship ; he was one of them. As a 
citizen of the State of which Chicago was the 
leading city, he had passed all his public life. 
The neighboring States sent thousands of peo- 
ple, for he was a Western man like themselves, 
and for the forty-eight hours that he lay in state 
a continuous stream of all sorts and conditions 
of men passed by sorrowing. 

In all these cities not a few mottoes were dis- 
played. Most of these were from his own writ- 
ings, such as, "With malice toward none, with 



292 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

charity for all" ; and, "We here highly resolve 
that these dead shall not have died in vain." 
Another v^as from the Bible: "He being dead 
yet speaketh" ; and another from Shakespeare : 

His life was gentle, and the elements 

So mix'd in him, that Nature might stand up 

And say to all the world, This was a man ! 

HOME AND REST 

His final resting-place was Springfield. Here, 
and in all the neighboring country, he was known 
to all. He had always a kind word for every 
one, and his goodness had not been forgotten. 
Those whom he had befriended had delighted 
to tell of it. They came to do honor not merely 
to the great statesman, but to the beloved friend, 
the warm-hearted neighbor. Many could remem- 
ber his grave face as he stood on the platform of 
the car that rainy morning in February, 1861, 
and said affectionately to his friends, "I must 
leave you : for how long I know not." Between 
the two days, what a noble life had been lived! 
What services had been rendered to his country 
and to mankind ! 

THE world's tributes 

"The funeral pageant was at an end," says 
Ida M. Tarbell, "but the mourning was not si- 
lenced. From every corner of the earth came to 
the family and to the Government tributes to the 
greatness of the character and life of the mur- 
dered man. Medals were cast, tablets engraved, 
parchments engrossed. At the end of the year, 
when the State Department came to publish the 



DEATH OF LINCOLN 295 

diplomatic correspondence of 1865, there was a 
volume of over seven hundred pages, containing 
nothing but expressions of condolence and sym- 
pathy on Lincoln's death. Nor did the mourn- 
ing and the honor end there. From the day of 
his death until now the world has gone on rear- 
ing monuments to Abraham Lincoln." 



TRIBUTES AND STORIES 



THE GREATNESS 
OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN^ 

By Robert G. Ingersoll 

On the 1 2th of February, 1809, two babes 
were born — one in the woods of Kentucky, amid 
the hardships and poverty of pioneers; one in 
England, surrounded by wealth and culture. 
One was educated in the University of Nature, 
the other at Cambridge. One associated his 
name with the enfranchisement of labor, with 
the emancipation of millions, with the salvation 
of the Republic. He is known to us as Abraham 
Lincoln. The other broke the chains of super- 
stition and filled the world with intellectual 
light, and he is known as Charles Darwin. 

Nothing is grander than to break chains from 
the bodies of men — nothing nobler than to de- 
stroy the phantoms of the soul. Because of 
these two men the nineteenth century is illustri- 
ous. 

A few men and women make a nation glorious 
^Shakespeare made England immortal, Vol- 
taire civilized and humanized France; Goethe, 

^ Copyrighted, 1894, by Robert G. Ingersoll. Printed 
from the Dresden Edition of The Complete Works of Rob- 
ert G. Ingersoll by special permission. Portions of this ad- 
dress, as delivered by its author, are here omitted — mainly 
parts of letters and speeches quoted from Lincoln, and 
discussions on slavery, etc., elsewhere presented or treated 
in this series. 



298 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

Schiller and Humboldt lifted Germany into the 
light. Angelo, Raphael, Galileo • and Bruno 
crowned with fadeless laurel the Italian brow, 
and now the most precious treasure of the Great 
Republic is the memory of Abraham Lincoln. 

Every generation has its heroes, its icono- 
clasts, its pioneers, its ideals. The people al- 
ways have been and still are divided, at least 
into two classes — the many, who with their backs 
to the sunrise worship the past, and the few, who 
keep their faces toward the dawn — the many, 
who are satisfied with the world as it is ; the few, 
who labor and suffer for the future, for those 
to be, and who seek to rescue the oppressed, to 
destroy the cruel distinctions of caste, and to 
civilize mankind. 

Yet it sometimes happens that the liberator 
of one age becomes the oppressor of the next. 
His reputation becomes so great — he is so re- 
vered and worshiped — that his followers, in his 
name, attack the hero who endeavors to take an- 
other step in advance. 

The heroes of the Revolution, forgetting the 
justice for which they fought, put chains upon 
the limbs of others, and in their names the lovers 
of liberty were denounced as ingrates and 
traitors. 

During the Revolution our fathers, to justify 
their rebellion, dug down to the bed-rock of hu- 
man rights and planted their standard there. 
They declared that all men were entitled to lib- 
erty and that government derived its power 
from the consent of the governed. But when 
victory came, the great principles were forgot- 
ten and chains were put upon the limbs of men. 
Both of the great political parties were con- 



THE GREATNESS OF LINCOLN 299 

trolled by greed and selfishness. Both were the 
defenders and protectors of slavery. For nearly 
three-quarters of a century these parties had 
control of the Republic. The principal object 
of both parties was the protection of the infa- 
mous institution. Both were eager to secure the 
Southern vote and both sacrificed principle and 
honor upon the altar of success. 

At last the Whig party died and the Republi- 
can was born. This party was opposed to the 
further extension of slavery. The Democratic 
party of the South wished to make the " divine 
institution " national — while the Democrats of 
the North wanted the question decided by each 
Territory for itself. 

Each of these parties had conservatives and 
extremists. The extremists of the Democratic 
party were in the rear and wished to go back; 
the extremists of the Republican party were in 
the front, and wished to go forward. The ex- 
treme Democrat was willing to destroy the 
Union for the sake of slavery, and the extreme 
Republican was willing to destroy the Union for 
the sake of liberty. 

Neither party could succeed without the votes 
of its extremists. . . . 

Lincoln was educated in the University of 
Nature — educated by cloud and star — by field 
and winding stream — by billowed plains and sol- 
emn forests — by morning's birth and death of 
day — by storm and night — by the ever eager 
Spring — by Summer's wealth of leaf and vine 
and flower — the sad and transient glories of the 
Autumn woods — and Winter, builder of home 
and fireside, and whose storms without create 
the social warmth within. 



300 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

He was perfectly acquainted with the politi- 
cal questions of the day — heard them discussed 
at taverns and country stores, at voting places 
and courts and on the stump. He knew all the 
arguments for and against, and no man of his 
time was better equipped for intellectual con- 
flict. He knew the average mind — the thoughts 
of the people, the hopes and prejudices of his fel- 
low-men. He had the power of accurate state- 
ment. He was logical, candid and sincere. In 
addition, he had the "touch of nature that makes 
the whole world kin." 

In 1858 he was a candidate for the Senate 
against Stephen A. Douglas. 

The extreme Democrats would not vote for 
Douglas, but the extreme Republicans did vote 
for Lincoln. Lincoln occupied the middle 
ground, and was the compromise candidate of 
his own party. He lived for many years in the 
intellectual territory of compromise — in a part 
of our country settled by Northern and South- 
ern men — where Northern and Southern ideas 
met, and the ideas of the two sections were 
brought together and compared. 

The sympathies of Lincoln, his ties of kindred, 
were with the South. His convictions, his sense 
of justice, and his ideals, were with the North. 
He knew the horrors of slavery, and he felt the 
unspeakable ecstasies and glories of freedom. 
He had the kindness, the gentleness, of true 
greatness, and he could not have been a master ; 
he had the manhood and independence of true 
greatness, and he could not have been a slave. 
He was just, and was incapable of putting a 
burden upon others that he himself would not 
willingly bear. 



THE GREATNESS OF LINCOLN 301 

He was merciful and profound, and it was not 
necessary for him to read the history of the 
world to know that liberty and slavery could 
not live in the same nation, or in the same 
brain. Lincoln was a statesman. And there 
is this difference between a politician and a 
statesman. A politician schemes and works in 
every way to make the people do something for 
him. A statesman wishes to do something for 
the people. With him place and power are 
means to an end, and the end is the good of his 
country. 

In this campaign Lincoln demonstrated three 
things — first, that he was the intellectual su- 
perior of his opponent ; second, that he was 
right; and third, that a majority of the voters of 
Illinois were on his side. 

In i860 the Republic reached a crisis. The 
conflict between liberty and slavery could no 
longer be delayed. For three-quarters of a 
century the forces had been gathering for the 
battle. 

After the Revolution, principle was sacrificed 
for the sake of gain. The Constitution contra- 
dicted the Declaration. Liberty as a principle 
was held in contempt. Slavery took possession 
of the Government. Slavery made the laws, 
corrupted courts, dominated Presidents and de- 
moralized the people. 

I do not hold the South responsible for slav- 
ery any more than I do the North. The fact 
is, that individuals and nations act as they must. 
There is no chance. Back of every event — of 
every hope, prejudice, fancy and dream — of 
every opinion and belief — of every vice and vir- 
tue — of every smile and curse, is the efficient 



302 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

cause. The present moment is the child, and the 
necessary child, of all the past. . . . 

It is not a common thing to elect a really 
great man to fill the highest official position. I 
do not say that the great Presidents have been 
chosen by accident. Probably it would be bet- 
ter to say that they were the favorites of a happy 
chance. 

The average man is afraid of genius. He 
feels as an awkward man feels in the presence 
of a sleight-of-hand performer. He admires 
and suspects. Genius appears to carry too much 
sail — to lack prudence, has too much courage. 
The ballast of dullness inspires confidence. 

By a happy chance Lincoln was nominated 
and elected in spite of his fitness — and the pa- 
tient, gentle, just and loving man was called 
upon to bear as great a burden as man has ever 
borne. . . . 

When Lincoln became President, he was 
held in contempt by the South — underrated by 
the North and East — not appreciated even by his 
Cabinet — and yet he was not only one of the 
wisest, but one of the shrewdest of mankind. 
Knowing that he had the right to enforce the 
laws of the Union in all parts of the United 
States and Territories — knowing, as he did, that 
the secessionists were in the wrong, he also knew 
that they had sympathizers not only in the North, 
but in other lands. 

Consequently, he felt that it was of the utmost 
importance that the South should fire the first 
shot, should do some act that would solidify the 
North, and gain for us the justification of the 
civilized world. 

He proposed to give food to the soldiers at 



THE GREATNESS OF LINCOLN 303 

Sumter. He asked the advice of all his Cabi- 
net on this question, and all, with the exception 
of Montgomery Blair, answered in the nega- 
tive, giving their reasons in writing. In spite of 
this, Lincoln took his own course — endeavored 
to send the supplies, and while thus engaged, 
doing his simple duty, the South commenced 
actual hostilities and fired on the fort. The 
course pursued by Lincoln was absolutely right, 
and the act of the South to a great extent solidi- 
fied the North, and gained for the Republic the 
justification of a great number of people in other 
lands. 

At that time Lincoln appreciated the scope 
and consequences of the impending conflict. 
Above all other thoughts in his mind was this : 

"This conflict will settle the question, at least 
for centuries to come, whether man is capable 
of governing himself, and consequently is of 
greater importance to the free than to the en- 
slaved." 

He knew what depended on the issue and said : 

"We shall nobly save, or meanly lose, the last, 
best hope of earth." 

Then came a crisis in the North. It became 
clearer and clearer to Lincoln's mind, day by 
day, that the rebellion was slavery, and that it 
was necessary to keep the border States on the 
side of the Union. For this purpose he proposed 
a scheme of emancipation and colonization — a 
scheme by which the owners of slaves should 
be paid the full value of what they called their 
''property." 

He knew that if the border States agreed to 
gradual emancipation, and received compensa- 
tion for their slaves, they would be forever lost 



304 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

to the Confederacy, whether secession succeeded 
or not. It was objected at the time, by some, 
that the scheme was far too expensive ; but Lin- 
coln, wiser than his advisers — far wiser than his 
enemies — demonstrated that from an econom- 
ical point of view his course was best. 

He proposed that $400 be paid for slaves, in- 
cluding men, women and children. This was 
a large price, and yet he showed how much 
cheaper it was to purchase than to carry on the 
war. 

At that time, at the price mentioned, there 
were about $750,000 worth of slaves in Dela- 
ware. The cost of carrying on the war was at 
least two millions of dollars a day, and for one- 
third of one day's expenses all the slaves in 
Delaware could be purchased. He also showed 
that all the slaves in Delaware, Maryland, Ken- 
tucky, and Missouri could be bought, at the 
same price, for less than the expense of carry- 
ing on the war for eighty-seven days. 

This was the wisest thing that could have 
been proposed, and yet such was the madness of 
the South, such the indignation of the North, 
that the advice was unheeded. 

Again, in July, 1862, he urged on the Repre- 
sentatives of the border States a scheme of grad- 
ual compensated emancipation ; but the Repre- 
sentatives were too deaf to hear, too blind to 
see. . . . 

On the 226. of July, 1862, Lincoln sent word 
to the members of his Cabinet that he wished to 
see them: It so happened that Secretary Chase 
was the first to arrive. He found Lincoln read- 
ing a book. Looking up from the page, the 
President said: ''Chase, did you ever read this 



THE GREATNESS OF LINCOLN 305 

book?" ''What book is it?" asked Chase. 
''Artemus Ward," repHed Lincohi. "Let me 
read you this chapter, entitled 'Wax Wurx in 
Albany.' " And so he began reading while the 
other members of the Cabinet one by one came 
in. At last Stanton told Mr. Lincoln that he 
was in a great hurry, and if any business was to 
be done he would like to do it at once. Where- 
upon Mr. Lincoln laid down the open book, 
opened a drawer, took out a paper and said: 
"Gentlemen, I have called you together to no- 
tify you what I have determined to do. I want 
no advice. Nothing can change my mind." 

He then read the Proclamation of Emancipa- 
tion. Chase thought there ought to be some- 
thing about God at the close, to which Lincoln 
replied : "Put it in, it won't hurt it." It was 
also agreed that the President would wait for a 
victory in the field before giving the Proclama- 
tion to the world. 

The meeting was over, the members went 
their way. Mr. Chase was the last to go, and as 
he went through the door looked back and saw 
that Mr. Lincoln had taken up the book and was 
again engrossed in the "Wax Wurx in Albany." 

This was on the 22d of July, 1862. On the 
22d of August of the same year — after Lincoln 
wrote his celebrated letter to Horace Greeley, 
in which he stated that his object was to save 
the Union ; that he would save it with slavery if 
he could; that if it was necessary to destroy 
slavery in order to save the Union, he would; 
in other words, he would do what was necessary 
to save the Union. . . . 

Lincoln was by nature a diplomat. He knew 
the art of sailing against the wind. He had as 



3o6 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

much shrewdness as Is consistent with honesty. 
He understood, not only the rights of Indi- 
viduals, but of nations. In all his correspondence 
with other governments he neither wrote nor 
sanctioned a line which afterward was used to 
tie his hands. In the use of perfect English he 
easily rose above all his advisers and all his 
fellows. 

No one claims that Lincoln did all. He 
could have done nothing without the generals 
In the field, and the generals could have done 
nothing without their armies. The praise Is due 
to all — to the private as much as to the officer ; 
to the lowest who did his duty, as much as to 
the highest. 

My heart goes out to the brave private as 
much as to the leader of the host. 

But Lincoln stood at the centre and with In- 
finite patience, with consummate skill, with the 
genius of goodness, directed, cheered, consoled, 
and conquered. . . . 

Lincoln always saw the end. He was un- 
moved by the storms and currents of the times. 
He advanced too rapidly for the conservative 
politicians, too slowly for the radical enthusi- 
asts. He occupied the line of safety, and held 
by his personality — by the force of his great 
character, by his charming candor — ^the masses 
on his side. 

The soldiers thought of him as a father. 

All who had lost their sons in battle felt that 
they had his sympathy — felt that his face was 
as sad as theirs. They knew that Lincoln was 
actuated by one motive, and that his energies 
were bent to the attainment of one end — the sal- 
vation of the Republic. 



THE GREATNESS OF LINCOLN 307 

They knew that he was kind, sincere, and mer- 
ciful. They knew that in his veins there was 
no drop of tyrants' blood. They knew that he 
used his power to protect the innocent, to save 
reputation and life — that he had the brain of a 
philosopher — the heart of a mother. 

During all the years of war, Lincoln stood the 
embodiment of mercy, between discipline and 
death. He pitied the imprisoned and condemned. 
He took the unfortunate in his arms, and was 
the friend even of the convict. He knew temp- 
tation's strength — the weakness of the will — 
and how in fury's sudden flame the judgment 
drops the scales, and passion — blind and deaf — 
usurps the throne. 

One day a woman, accompanied by a Senator, 
called on the President. The woman was the 
wife of one of Mosby's men. Her husband had 
been captured, tried, and condemned to be shot. 
She came to ask for the pardon of her husband. 
The President heard her story and then asked 
what kind of a man her husband was. *Ts he 
intemperate, does he abuse the children and beat 
you?" *'No, no," said the wife, ''he is a good 
man, a good husband, he loves me and he loves 
the children, and we cannot live without him. 
The only trouble is that he is a fool about poli- 
tics — I live in the North, born there, and if I 
get him home, he will do no more fighting for 
the South." ''Well," said Mr. Lincoln, after ex- 
amining the papers, "I will pardon your husband 
and turn him over to you for safe keeping." 
The poor woman, overcome with joy, sobbed as 
though her heart would break. 

"My dear woman," said Lincoln, "if I had 
known how badly it was going to make you feel. 



3o8 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

I never would have pardoned him." "You do 
not understand me," she cried between her 
sobs. "You do not understand me." "Yes, yes, 
I do," answered the President, "and if you do 
not go away at once I shall be crying with 
you." 

On another occasion, a member of Congress, 
on his way to see Lincoln, found in one of the 
anterooms of the White House an old white- 
haired man, sobbing — his wrinkled face wet with 
tears. The old man told him that for several 
days he had tried to see the President — that he 
wanted a pardon for his son. The Congressman 
told the old man to come with him and he would 
introduce him to Mr. Lincoln. On being intro- 
duced, the old man said : "Mr. Lincoln, my wife 
sent me to you. We had three boys. They all 
joined your army. One of 'em has been killed, 
one's a-fighting now, and one of 'em, the young- 
est, has been tried for deserting and he's going 
to be shot day after to-morrow. He never de- 
serted. He's wild, and he may have drunk too 
much and wandered of¥, but he never deserted. 
'Tain't in the blood. He's his mother's favor- 
ite, and if he's shot, I know she'll die." The 
President, turning to his secretary, said: "Tele- 
graph General Butler to suspend the execution 

in the case of [giving his name] until 

further orders from me, and ask him to an- 
swer " 

The Congressman congratulated the old man 
on his success — but the old man did not respond. 
He was not satisfied. "Mr. President," he be- 
gan, "I can't take that news home. It won't sat- 
isfy his mother. How do I know but what you'll 
give further orders to-morrow?" "My good 



THE GREATNESS OF LINCOLN 309 

man," said Mr. Lincoln, *'I have to do the best 
I can. The generals are complaining because I 
pardon so many. They say that my mercy de- 
stroys discipline. Now, when you get home you 
tell his mother what you said to me about my 
giving further orders, and then you tell her that 
I said this : Tf your son lives until they get fur- 
ther orders from me, that when he does die 
people will say that old Methuselah was a baby 
compared to him.' " 

The pardoning power is the only remnant 
of absolute sovereignty that a President has. 
Through all the years, Lincoln will be known as 
Lincoln the loving, Lincoln the merciful. 

Lincoln had the keenest sense of humor, and 
always saw the laughable side even of disaster. 
In his humor there was logic and the best of 
sense. No matter how complicated the ques- 
tion, or how embarrassing the situation, his hu- 
mor furnished an answer and a door of escape. 

Vallandigham was a friend of the South, and 
did what he could to sow the seeds of failure. 
In his opinion everything, except rebellion, was 
tmconstitutional. 

He was arrested, convicted by a court mar- 
tial, and sentenced to imprisonment. 

There was doubt about the legality of the trial, 
and thousands in the North denounced the whole 
proceeding as tyrannical and infamous. At the 
same time millions demanded that Vallandigham 
should be punished. 

Lincoln's humor came to the rescue. He dis- 
approved of the findings of the court, changed 
the punishment, and ordered that Mr. Vallan- 
digham should be sent to his friends in the 
South. Those who regarded the act as uncon- 



3IO TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

stitutional almost forgave it for the sake of its 
humor. 

Horace Greeley always had the idea that he 
was greatly superior to Lincoln, because he lived 
in a larger town, and for a long time insisted 
that the people of the North and the people of 
the South desired peace. He took it upon him- 
self to lecture Lincoln. Lincoln, with that won- 
derful sense of humor, united with shrewdness 
and profound wisdom, told Greeley that, if the 
South really wanted peace, he (Lincoln) desired 
the same thing, and was doing all he could to 
bring it about. Greeley insisted that a commis- 
sioner should be appointed, with authority to 
negotiate with the representatives of the Con- 
federacy. This was Lincoln's opportunity. He 
authorized Greeley to act as such commis- 
sioner. The great editor felt that he was caught. 
For a time he hesitated, but finally went, and 
found that the Southern commissioners were 
willing to take into consideration any offers of 
peace that Lincoln might make, consistent with 
the independence of the Confederacy. 

The failure of Greeley was humiliating, and 
the position in which he was left, absurd. 

Again the humor of Lincoln had triumphed. 

Lincoln, to satisfy a few fault-finders in the 
North, went to Grant's headquarters and met 
some Confederate commissioners. He urged 
that it was hardly proper for him to negotiate 
with the representatives of rebels in arms — ^that 
if the South wanted peace, all they had to do 
was to stop fighting. One of the commissioners 
cited as a precedent the fact that Charles the 
First negotiated with rebels in arms. To which 
Lincoln replied that Charles the First lost his 



THE GREATNESS OF LINCOLN 311 

head. The conference came to nothing, as Mr. 
Lincoln expected. 

The commissioners, one of them being x\lex- 
ander H. Stephens, who, when in good health, 
weighed about ninety pounds, dined with the 
President and General Grant. After dinner, as 
they were leaving, Stephens put on an English 
ulster, the tails of which reached the ground, 
while the collar was somewhat above the wear- 
er's head. 

As Stephens went out, Lincoln touched Grant 
and said : ''Grant, look at Stephens. Did you 
ever see as little a nubbin with as much 
shuck?" 

Lincoln always tried to do things in the easiest 
way. He did not waste his strength. He was 
not particular about moving along straight lines. 
He did not tunnel the mountains. He was will- 
ing to go around, and reach the end desired as a 
river reaches the sea. 

One of the most wonderful things ever done 
by Lincoln was the promotion of General 
Hooker. After the battle of Fredericksburg, 
General Burnside found great fault with Hook- 
er, and wished to have him removed from the 
Army of the Potomac. Lincoln disapproved of 
Burnside's order, and gave Hooker the com- 
mand. He then wrote Hooker this memorable 
letter : 

'T have placed you at the head of the Army 
of the Potomac. Of course I have done this 
upon what appear to me to be sufficient reasons, 
and yet I think it best for you to know that 
there are some things in regard to which I am 
not quite satisfied with you. I believe you to be 
a brave and skilful soldier — which, of course, I 



312 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

like. I also believe you do not mix politics with 
your profession — in which you are right. You 
have confidence — which is a valuable, if not 
an indispensable, quality. You are ambitious, 
which, within reasonable bounds, does good 
rather than harm; but I think that during Gen- 
eral Burnside's command of the army you have 
taken counsel of your ambition to thwart him as 
much as you could — in which you did a great 
wrong to the country and to a most meritorious 
and honorable brother officer. I have heard, in 
such a way as to believe it, of your recently say- 
ing that both the army and the Government 
needed a dictator. Of course it was not for this, 
but in spite of it, that I have given you com- 
mand. Only those generals who gain successes 
can set up dictators. What I now ask of you is 
military successes, and I will risk the dictator- 
ship. The Government will support you to the 
utmost of its ability, which is neither more nor 
less than it has done and will do for all com- 
manders. I much fear that the spirit which you 
have aided to infuse into the army, of criticising 
their commander and withholding confidence in 
him, will now turn upon you. I shall assist you, 
so far as I can, to put it down. Neither you, 
nor Napoleon, if he were alive, can get any good 
out of an army while such a spirit prevails in 
it. And now beware of rashness. Beware of 
rashness, but with energy and sleepless vigi- 
lance go forward and give us victories." 

This letter has, in my judgment, no parallel. 
The mistaken magnanimity is almost equal to 
the prophecy: 

'T much fear that the spirit which you have 
aided to infuse into the army, of criticising their 



THE GREATNESS OF LINCOLN 313 

commander and withholding confidence in him, 
will now turn upon you." 

Chancellorsville was the fulfilment. 

Mr. Lincoln was a statesman. The great 
stumbling-block — the great obstruction — in Lin- 
coln's way, and in the way of thousands, was 
the old doctrine of States' Rights. 

This doctrine was first established to protect 
slavery. It was clung to to protect the inter- 
state slave trade. It became sacred in connec- 
tion with the Fugitive Slave Law, and it was 
finally used as the corner-stone of secession. 

This doctrine was never appealed to in defence 
of the right — always in support of the wrong. 
For many years politicians upon both sides of 
this question endeavored to express the exact 
relations existing between the Federal Govern- 
ment and the States, and I know of no one who 
succeeded except Lincoln. In his message of 
186], delivered on July the 4th, the definition is 
given, and it is perfect: 

''Whatever concerns the whole should be con- 
fided to the whole — to the General Government. 
Whatever concerns only the State should be left 
exclusively to the State." 

When that definition is realized in practice, 
this country becomes a nation. Then we shall 
know that the first allegiance of the citizen is 
not to his State, but to the Republic, and that 
the first duty of the Republic is to protect the 
citizen, not only when in other lands, but at 
home, and that this duty cannot be discharged 
by delegating it to the States. 

Lincoln believed in the sovereignty of the peo- 
ple — in the supremacy of the nation — in the ter- 
ritorial integrity of the Republic. 



314 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

A great actor can be known only when he has 
assumed the principal character in a great drama. 
Possibly the greatest actors have never appeared, 
and it may be that the greatest soldiers have 
lived the lives of perfect peace. Lincoln as- 
sumed the leading part in the greatest drama 
ever enacted upon the stage of this continent. 

His criticisms of military movements, his cor- 
respondence with his generals and others on the 
conduct of the war, show that he was at all times 
master of the situation — that he was a natural 
strategist, that he appreciated the difficulties and 
advantages of every kind, and that in "the still 
and mental" field of war he stood the peer of 
any man beneath the flag. 

Had McClellan followed his advice, he would 
have taken Richmond. 

Had Hooker acted in accordance with his sug- 
gestions, Chancellorsville would have been a 
victory for the nation. 

Lincoln's political prophecies were all fulfilled. 

We know now that he not only stood at the 
top, but that he occupied the centre, from first 
to last, and that he did this by reason of his 
intelligence, his humor, his philosophy, his cour- 
age and his patriotism. 

In passion's storm he stood, unmoved, patient, 
just and candid. In his brain there was no 
cloud, and in his heart no hate. He longed 
to save the South as well as North, to see the 
nation one and free. 

He lived until the end was known. 

He lived until the Confederacy was dead — 
until Lee surrendered, until Davis fled, until the 
doors of Libby Prison were opened, until the 
Republic was supreme. 



THE GREATNESS OF LINCOLN 315 

He lived until Lincoln and Liberty were united 
forever. 

He lived to cross the desert — to reach the 
palms of victory — to hear the murmured music 
of the welcome waves. 

He lived until all loyal hearts were his — until 
the history of his deeds made music in the souls 
of men — until he knew that on Columbia's Cal- 
endar of worth and fame his name stood first. 

He lived until there remained nothing for him 
to do as great as he had done. 

What he did was worth living for, worth dy- 
ing for. 

He lived until he stood in the midst of uni- 
versal Joy, beneath the outstretched wings of 
Peace — the foremost man in all the world. 

And then the horror came. Night fell on 
noon. The Savior of the Republic, the breaker 
of chains, the liberator of millions, he who had 
^'assured freedom to the free," was dead. 

Upon his brow Fame placed the immortal 
wreath, and for the first time in the history of 
the world a nation bowed and wept. 

The memory of Lincoln is the strongest, ten- 
derest tie that binds all hearts together now, and 
holds all States beneath a nation's flag. 

Abraham Lincoln — strange mingling of mirth 
and tears, of the tragic and grotesque, of cap 
and crown, of Socrates and Democritus, of 
^sop and Marcus Aurelius, of all that is gentle 
and just, humorous and honest, merciful, wise, 
laughable, lovable and divine, and all conse- 
crated to the use of man ; while through all, and 
over all, were an overwhelming sense of obliga- 
tion, of chivalric loyalty to truth, and upon all, 
the shadow of the tragic end. 



3i6 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

Nearly all the great historic characters are 
impossible monsters, disproportioned by flattery, 
or by calumny deformed. We know nothing of 
their peculiarities, or nothing but their peculiar- 
ities. About these oaks there clings none of the 
earth of humanity. 

Washington is now only a steel engraving. 
About the real man who lived and loved and 
hated and schemed, we know but little. The 
glass through which we look at him is of such 
high magnifying power that the features are ex- 
ceedingly indistinct. 

Hundreds of people are now engaged in 
smoothing out the lines of Lincoln's face — forc- 
ing all features to the common mould — so that 
he may be known, not as he really was, but, ac- 
cording to their poor standard, as he should have 
been. 

Lincoln was not a type. He stands alone — 
no ancestors, no fellows, no successors. 

He had the advantage of living in a new 
country, of social equality, of personal freedom, 
of seeing in the horizon of his future the per- 
petual star of hope. He preserved his individ- 
uality and his self-respect. He knew and min- 
gled with men of every kind; and, after all, 
men are the best books. He became acquainted 
with the ambitions and hopes of the heart, the 
means used to accomplish ends, the springs of 
action, and the seeds of thought. He was fa- 
miliar with nature, with actual things, with 
common facts. He loved and appreciated the 
poem of the year, the drama of the seasons. 

In a new country, a man must possess at 
least three virtues — honesty, courage, and gen- 
erosity. In cultivated society, cultivation is 



THE GREATNESS OF LINCOLN 317 

often more important than soil. A well-exe- 
cuted counterfeit passes more readily than a 
blurred genuine. It is necessary only to observe 
the unwritten laws of society — to be honest 
enough to keep out of prison, and generous 
enough to subscribe in public — where the sub- 
scription can be defended as an investment. 

In a new country, character is essential ; in the 
old, reputation is sufficient. In the new, they 
find what a man really is; in the old, he gener- 
ally passes for what he resembles. People sepa- 
rated only by distance are much nearer together 
than those divided by the walls of caste. 

It is no advantage to live in a great city, where 
poverty degrades and failure brings despair. 
The fields are lovelier than paved streets, and 
the great forests than walls of brick. Oaks and 
elms are more poetic than steeples and chimneys. 

In the country is the idea of home. There 
you see the rising and setting sun ; you become 
acquainted with the stars and clouds. The con- 
stellations are your friends. You hear the rain 
on the roof and listen to the rhythmic sighing 
of the winds. You are thrilled by the resur- 
rection called Spring, touched and saddened by 
Autumn — the grace and poetry of death. Every 
field is a picture, a landscape ; every landscape 
a poem ; every flower a tender thought, and every 
forest a fairy-land. In the country you preserve 
your identity — your personality. There you are 
an aggregation of atoms, but in the city you are 
only an atom of an aggregation. 

In the country you keep your cheek close to 
the breast of Nature. You are calmed and en- 
nobled by the space, the amplitude and scope 
of earth and sky — by the constancy of the stars. 



3i8 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

Lincoln never finished his education. To the 
night of his death he was a pupil, a learner, 
an inquirer, a seeker after knowledge. You have 
no idea how many men are spoiled by what is 
called education. For the most part, colleges are 
places where pebbles are polished and diamonds 
are dimmed. If Shakespeare had graduated at 
Oxford, he might have been a quibbling attor- 
ney, or a hypocritical parson. 

Lincoln was a great lawyer. There is noth- 
ing shrewder in this world than intelligent hon- 
esty. Perfect candor is sword and shield. 

He understood the nature of man. As a law- 
yer he endeavored to get at the truth, at the 
very heart of a case. He was not willing even 
to deceive himself. No matter what his inter- 
est said, what his passion demanded, he was great 
enough to find the truth and strong enough to 
pronounce judgment against his own desires. 

Lincoln was a many-sided man, acquainted 
with smiles and tears, complex in brain, single 
in heart, direct as light; and his words, candid 
as mirrors, gave the perfect image of his thought. 
He was never afraid to ask — never too dignified 
to admit that he did not know. No man had 
keener wit, or kinder humor. 

It may be that humor is the pilot of reason. 
People without humor drift unconsciously into 
absurdity. Humor sees the other side — stands 
in the mind like a spectator, a good-natured 
critic, and gives its opinion before judgment is 
reached. Humor goes with good nature, and 
good nature is the climate of reason. In anger, 
reason abdicates and malice extinguishes the 
torch- Such was the humor of Lincoln that he 
could tell even unpleasant truths as charmingly 



THE GREATNESS OF LINCOLN 319 

as most men can tell the things we wish to 
hear. 

He was not solemn. Solemnity is a mask 
worn by ignorance and hypocrisy — it is the pref- 
ace, prologue, and index to the cunning or the 
stupid. 

He was natural in his life and thought — mas- 
ter of the story-teller's art, in illustration apt, in 
application perfect, liberal in speech, shocking 
Pharisees and prudes, using any word that wit 
could disinfect. 

He was a logician. His logic shed light. In 
its presence the obscure became luminous, and 
the most complex and intricate political and 
metaphysical knots seemed to untie themselves. 
Logic is the necessary product of intelligence 
and sincerity. It cannot be learned. It is the 
child of a clear head and a good heart. 

Lincoln was candid, and with candor often 
deceived the deceitful. He had intellect with- 
out arrogance, genius without pride, and religion 
without cant — that is to say, without bigotry and 
without deceit. 

He was an orator — clear, sincere, natural. He 
did not pretend. He did not say what he thought 
others thought, but what he thought. 

If you wish to be sublime you must be natural 
— you must keep close to the grass. You must 
sit by the fireside of the heart ; above the clouds 
it is too cold. You must be simple in your 
speech ; too much polish suggests insincerity. 

The great orator idealizes the real, transfigures 
the common, makes even the inanimate throb 
and thrill, fills the gallery of the imagination 
with statues and pictures perfect in form and 
color, brings to light the gold hoarded by mem- 



320 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

ory the miser, shows the ghttering coin to the 
spendthrift hope, enriches the brain, ennobles 
the heart, and quickens the conscience. Between 
his Hps words bud and blossom. 

If you wish to know the difference between 
an orator and an elocutionist — between what is 
felt and what is said^ — between what the heart 
and brain can do together and what the brain 
can do alone — read Lincoln's wondrous speech 
at Gettysburg, and then the oration of Edward 
Everett. 

The speech of Lincoln will never be forgot- 
ten. It will live until languages are dead and 
lips are dust. The oration of Everett will never 
be read. 

The elocutionists believe in the virtue of voice, 
the sublimity of syntax, the majesty of long sen- 
tences, and the genius of gesture. 

The orator loves the real, the simple, the nat- 
ural. He places the thought above all. He 
knows that the greatest ideas should be ex- 
pressed in the shortest words — that the greatest 
statues need the least drapery. 

Lincoln was an immense personality — firm but 
not obstinate. Obstinacy is egotism — firmness, 
heroism. He influenced others without effort, 
unconsciously ; and they submitted to him as men 
submit to nature — unconsciously. He was severe 
with himself, and for that reason lenient with 
others. 

He appeared to apologize for being kinder 
than his fellows. 

He did merciful things as stealthily as others 
committed crimes. 

Almost ashamed of tenderness, he said and did 
the noblest words and deeds with that charming 



THE GREATNESS OF LINCOLN 321 

confusion, that awkwardness, that is the perfect 
grace of modesty. 

As a noble man, wishing to pay a small debt 
to a poor neighbor, reluctantly offers a hundred- 
dollar bill and asks for change, fearing that he 
may be suspected either of making a display of 
wealth or a pretence of payment, so Lincoln 
hesitated to show his wealth of goodness, even 
to the best he knew. 

A great man stooping, not wishing to make 
his fellows feel that they were small or mean. 

By his candor, by his kindness, by his perfect 
freedom from restraint, by saying what he 
thought, and saying it absolutely in his own way, 
he made it not only possible, but popular, to be 
natural. He was the enemy of mock solemnity, 
of the stupidly respectable, of the cold and for- 
mal. 

He wore no official robes either on his body 
or his soul. He never pretended to be more or 
less, or other, or different, from what he really 
was. He had the unconscious naturalness of 
Nature's self. 

He built upon the rock. The foundation was 
secure and broad. The structure was a pyramid, 
narrowing as it rose. Through days and nights 
of sorrow, through years of grief and pain, with 
unswerving purpose, *'with malice toward none, 
with charity for all," with infinite patience, with 
tmclouded vision, he hoped and toiled. Stone 
after stone was laid, until at last the Proclama- 
tion found its place. On that the Goddess stands. 

He knew others, because perfectly acquainted 
with himself. He cared nothing for place, but 
everything for principle; little for money, but 
everything for independence. Where no prin- 



322 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

ciple was involved, easily swayed — willing to go 
slowly, if in the right direction — sometimes will- 
ing to stop; but he would not go back, and he 
would not go wrong. 

He was willing to wait. He knew that the 
event was not waiting, and that fate was not 
the fool of chance. He knew that slavery had 
defenders, but no defence, and that they who at- 
tack the right must wound themselves. He was 
neither tyrant nor slave. He neither knelt nor 
scorned. With him, men were neither great 
nor small' — they were right or wrong. 

Through manners, clothes, titles, rags and race 
he saw the real — that which is. Beyond accident, 
policy, compromise and war he saw the end. 

He was patient as Destiny, whose undecipher- 
able hieroglyphs were so deeply graven on his 
sad and tragic face. 

Nothing discloses real character like the use of 
power. It is easy for the weak to be gentle. 
Most people can bear adversity. But if you wish 
to know what a man really is, give him power. 
This is the supreme test. It is the glory of Lin- 
coln that, having almost absolute power, he 
never abused it, except on the side of mercy. 

Wealth could not purchase, power could not 
awe, this divine, this loving man. 

He knew no fear except the fear of doing 
wrong. Hating slavery, pitying the master — 
seeking to conquer, not persons, but prejudices 
— he was the embodiment of the self-denial, the 
courage, the hope and the nobility of a nation. 

He spoke not to inflame, not to upbraid, but 
to convince. 

He raised his hands, not to strike, but in bene- 
diction. 



THE GREATNESS OF LINCOLN 323 

He longed to pardon. 

He loved to see the pearls of joy on the cheeks 
of a wife whose husband he had rescued from 
death. 

Lincoln was the grandest figure of the fiercest 
civil war. He is the gentlest memory of our 
world. 



A MAN INSPIRED OF GOD 



By Henry Watterson 

Amid the noise and confusion, the clashing of 
intellects like sabres bright, and the booming of 
the big oratorical guns of the North and the 
South, now definitely arrayed, there came one day 
into the Northern camp one of the oddest figures 
imaginable ; the figure of a man who, in spite of 
an appearance somewhat at outs with Hogarth's 
line of beauty, wore a serious aspect, if not an 
air of command, and, pausing to utter a single 
sentence that might be heard above the din, 
passed on and for a moment disappeared. The 
sentence was pregnant with meaning. The man 
bore a commission from God on High ! He said : 
*'A house divided against itself cannot stand. I 
believe this Government cannot endure perma- 
nently half free and half slave. I do not expect 
the Union to be dissolved; I do not expect the 
house to fall; but I do expect it will cease to 
be divided." He was Abraham Lincoln. 

How shall I describe him to you ? Shall I speak 
of him as I first saw him immediately on his ar- 
rival in the national capital, the chosen President 
of the United States, his appearance quite as 
strange as the story of his life, which was then 
but half known and half told, or shall I use 

^ Reprinted by permission of Mr. Watterson. The parts 
omitted are chiefly such as relate to matters sufficiently 
dealt with in other places in the present edition. 



A MAN INSPIRED OF GOD 325 

the words of another and more graphic word- 
painter ? 

In January, 1861, Colonel A. K. McClure, of 
Pennsylvania, journeyed to Springfield, 111., to 
meet and confer with the man he had done so 
much to elect, but whom he had never personally 
known. ''I went directly from the depot to Lin- 
coln's house," says Colonel McClure, ''and rang 
the bell, which was answered by Lincoln himself 
opening the door. I doubt whether I wholly 
concealed my disappointment at meeting him. 
Tall, gaunt, ungainly, ill-clad, with a homeliness 
of manner that was unique in itself, I confess 
that my heart sank within me as I remembered 
that this was the man chosen by a great nation 
to become its ruler in the gravest period of its 
history. I remember his dress as if it were but 
yesterday — snuff-colored and slouchy pantaloons ; 
open black vest, held by a few brass buttons ; 
straight or evening dress-coat, with tightly fitting 
sleeves to exaggerate his long, bony arms ; all 
supplemented by an awkwardness that was un- 
common among men of intelligence. Such was 
the picture I met in the person of Abraham Lin- 
coln. We sat down in his plainly furnished par- 
lor, and were uninterrupted during the nearly 
four hours I remained with him, and, little by 
little, as his earnestness, sincerity, and candor 
were developed in conversation, I forgot all the 
grotesque qualities which so confounded me 
when I first greeted him. Before half an hour 
had passed I learned not only to respect, but, 
indeed, to reverence the man." 

A graphic portrait, truly, and not unlike. I 
recall him, two months later, a little less un- 
couth, a little better dressed, but in singularity 



326 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

and in angularity much the same. All the world 
now takes an interest in every detail that con- 
cerned him, or that relates to the weird tragedy 
of his life and death. 

Two or three years ago I referred to Abraham 
Lincoln — in a casual way — as one "inspired of 
God." I was taken to task for this and thrown 
upon my defence. Knowing less then than I now 
know of Mr. Lincoln, I confined myself to the 
superficial aspects of the case ; to the career of 
a man who seemed to have lacked the opportu- 
nity to prepare himself for the great estate to 
which he had come, plucked as it were from 
obscurity by a caprice of fortune. 

Accepting the doctrine of inspiration as a law 
of the universe, I still stand to this belief ; but I 
must qualify it as far as it conveys the idea that 
Mr. Lincoln was not as well equipped in actual 
knowledge of men and affairs as any of his con- 
temporaries. Mr. Webster once said that he had 
been preparing to make his reply to Hayne for 
thirty years. Mr. Lincoln had been in uncon- 
scious training for the Presidency for thirty 
years. His maiden address as a candidate for 
the Legislature, issued at the ripe old age of 
twenty-three, closes with these words, "But if 
the good people in their wisdom shall see fit to 
keep me in the background, I have been too fa- 
miliar with disappointment to be very much cha- 
grined." The man who wrote that sentence, 
thirty years later wrote this sentence: "The mys- 
tic chords of memory, stretching from every 
battlefield and patriot grave to every living 
heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, 
will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when 
again touched, as surely they will be, by the 



A MAN INSPIRED OF GOD 327 

better angels of our nature." Between those 
two sentences, joined by a kindred, sombre 
thought, flowed a Hfe-current, ''strong, without 
rage, without o'erflowing, full," pausing never 
for an instant; deepening while it ran, but no- 
wise changing its course or its tones ; always the 
same ; calm ; patient ; affectionate ; like one born 
to a destiny, and, as in a dream, feeling its resist- 
less force. 

I met the newly elected President the after- 
noon of the day in the early morning of which he 
had arrived in Washington. It was a Saturday, 
I think. He came to the Capitol under Mr. 
Seward's escort, and, among the rest, I was pre- 
sented to him. His appearance did not impress 
me as fantastically as it had impressed Colonel 
McClure. I was more familiar with the West- 
ern type than Colonel McClure, and while Mr. 
Lincoln was certainly not an Adonis, even after 
prairie ideals, there was about him a dignity that 
commanded respect. 

I met him again the forenoon of March 4 in 
his apartment at Willard's Hotel as he was pre- 
paring to start to his inauguration, and was 
touched by his unaffected kindness ; for I came 
with a matter requiring his immediate attention. 
He was entirely self-possessed ; no trace of ner- 
vousness ; and very obliging. I accompanied the 
cortege that passed from the Senate chamber to 
the vast portico of the Capitol, and, as Mr. Lin- 
coln removed his hat to face the vast multitude in 
front and below, I extended my hand to receive 
it, but Judge Douglas, just beside me, reached 
over my outstretched arm and took the hat, hold- 
ing it throughout the delivery of the inaugural 
address. I stood near enough to the speaker's 



328 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

elbow not to obstruct any gestures he might 
make, though he made but few ; and then it was 
that I began to comprehend something of the 
power of the man. 

He deHvered that inaugural address as if he 
had been delivering inaugural addresses all his 
life. Firm, resonant, earnest, it announced the 
coming of a man ; of a leader of men ; and in its 
ringing tones and elevated style, the gentlemen 
he had invited to become members of his political 
family — each of whom thought himself a bigger 
man than his master — might have heard the voice 
and seen the hand of a man born to command. 
Whether they did or not, they very soon ascer- 
tained the fact. From the hour Abraham Lin- 
coln crossed the threshold of the White House 
to the hour he went thence to his death, there 
was not a moment when he did not dominate the 
political and military situation and all his official 
subordinates. 

Always courteous, always tolerant, always 
making allowance, yet always explicit, his was the 
master spirit, his the guiding hand ; committing 
to each of the members of his Cabinet the details 
of the work of his own department ; caring noth- 
ing for petty sovereignty ; but reserving to him- 
self all that related to great policies, the starting 
of moral forces and the moving of organized 
ideas. 

I want to say just here a few words about Mr. 
Lincoln's relation to the South and the people of 
the South. 

He was, himself, a Southern man. He and all 
his tribe were Southerners. Although he left 
Kentucky when but a child, he was an old child ; 
he never was very young; and he grew to man- 



A MAN INSPIRED OF GOD 329 

hood in a Kentucky colony ; for what was IIH- 
nois in those days but a Kentucky colony, grown 
since somewhat out of proportion? He was in 
no sense what we in the South used to call "a 
poor white." Awkward, perhaps ; ungainly, per- 
haps, but aspiring; the spirit of a hero beneath 
that rugged exterior; the soul of a prose-poet 
behind those heavy brows ; the courage of a lion 
back of those patient, kindly aspects ; and, be- 
fore he was of legal age, a leader of men. His 
first love was a Rutledge ; his wife was a Todd. 

Let the romancist tell the story of his romance. 
I dare not. No sadder idyl can be found in all 
the short and simple annals of the poor. 

We know that he was a prose-poet; for have 
we not that immortal prose-poem recited at Get- 
tysburg ? We know that he was a statesman ; for 
has not time vindicated his conclusions ? But the 
South does not know, except as a kind of hear- 
say, that he was a friend ; the sole friend who 
had the power and the will to save it from itself. 
He was the one man in public life who could 
have come to the head of affairs in 1861, bring- 
ing with him none of the embittered resentments 
growing out of the anti-slavery battle. Wliile 
Seward, Chase, Sumner, and the rest had been 
engaged in hand-to-hand combat with the South- 
ern leaders at Washington, Lincoln, a philosopher 
and a statesman, had been observing the course 
of events from afar, and like a philosopher and 
a statesman. The direst blow that could have 
been laid upon the prostrate South was delivered 
by the assassin's bullet that struck him down. 

But I digress. Throughout the contention that 
preceded the war, amid the passions that at- 
tended the war itself, not one bitter, proscriptive 



330 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

word escaped the lips of Abraham Lincoln, while 
there was hardly a day that he was not project- 
ing his great personality between some Southern 
man or woman and danger. 

Under date of February 2, 1848, from the hall 
of the House of Representatives at Washington, 
while he was serving as a member of Congress, 
he wrote this short note to his law partner at 
Springfield : 

"Dear William : I take up my pen to tell you 
that Mr. Stephens, of Georgia, a little, slim, pale- 
faced, consumptive man, with a voice like Lo- 
gan's" (that was Stephen T., not John A.), *'has 
just concluded the very best speech of an hour's 
length I ever heard. My old, withered, dry eyes" 
(he was then not quite thirty-nine years of age) 
*'are full of tears yet." 

From that time forward he never ceased to 
love Stephens, of Georgia. 

After that famous Hampton Roads confer- 
ence, when the Confederate Commissioners, 
Stephens, Campbell, and Hunter, had traversed 
the field of official routine with Mr. Lincoln, the 
President, and Mr. Seward, the Secretary of 
State, Lincoln, the friend, still the old Whig 
colleague, though one was now President of the 
United States and the other Vice-President of 
the Southern Confederacy, took the "slim, pale- 
faced, consumptive man" aside, and, pointing to 
a sheet of paper he held in his hand, said: 
"Stephens, let me write 'Union' at the top of that 
page, and you may write below it whatever else 
you please." 

In the preceding conversation Mr. Lincoln had 
intimated that payment for the slaves was not 
outside a possible agreement for reunion and 



A MAN INSPIRED OF GOD 2>Z^ 

peace. He based that statement upon a plan he 
already had in hand, to appropriate four hundred 
millions of dollars to this purpose. 

There are those who have put themselves to 
the pains of challenging this statement of mine. 
It admits of no possible equivocation. Mr. Lin- 
coln carried with him to Fort Monroe two docu- 
ments that still stand in his own handwriting; 
one of them a joint resolution to be passed 
by the two Houses of Congress appropriating 
the four hundred millions, the other a proclama- 
tion to be issued by himself, as President, when 
the joint resolution had been passed. These 
formed no part of the discussion at Hampton 
Roads, because Mr. Stephens told Mr. Lincoln 
they were limited to treating upon the basis of 
the recognition of the Confederacy, and to all 
intents and purposes the conference died before 
it was actually born. But Mr. Lincoln was so 
filled with the idea that next day, when he had 
returned to Washington, he submitted the two 
documents to the members of his Cabinet. Ex- 
cepting Mr. Seward, they were all against him. 
He said : ''Why, gentlemen, how long is the war 
going to last? It is not going to end this side 
of a hundred days, is it? It is costing us four 
millions a day. There are the four hundred 
millions, not counting the loss of life and prop- 
erty in the meantime. But you are all against 
me, and I will not press the matter upon you.'* 
I have not cited this fact of history to attack, 
or even to criticise, the policy of the Confed- 
erate Government, but simply to illustrate the 
wise magnanimity and justice of the character 
of Abraham Lincoln. For my part, I rejoice 
that the war did not end at Fort Monroe — or any 



332 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

other conference — but that it was fought out to 
its bitter and logical conclusion at Appomattox. 

It was the will of God that there should be, as 
God's own prophet had promised, "a new birth 
of freedom," and this could only be reached by 
the obliteration of the very idea of slavery. 
God struck Lincoln down in the moment of his 
triumph, to attain it; he blighted the South to 
attain it. But he did attain it. And here we 
are this night to attest it. God's will be done on 
earth as it is done in heaven. But let no South- 
ern man point finger at me because I canonize 
Abraham Lincoln, for he was the one friend we 
had at court when friends were most in need ; he 
was the one man in power who wanted to pre- 
serve us intact, to save us from the wolves of 
passion and plunder that stood at our door ; and 
as that God, of whom it has been said that 
''whom he loveth he chasteneth," meant that the 
South should be chastened, Lincoln was put out 
of the way by the bullet of an assassin having 
neither lot nor parcel. North or South, but a 
winged emissary of fate, flown from the shadows 
of the mystic world which ^schylus and Shake- 
speare created and consecrated to tragedy! 

One thinks now that the world in which 
Abraham Lincoln lived might have dealt more 
gently by such a man. He was himself so gentle 
— so upright in nature and so broad of mind — so 
sunny and so tolerant in temper — so simple and 
so unaffected in bearing — a rude exterior cover- 
ing an undaunted spirit, proving by his every 
act and word that — 



The bravest are the tenderest, 
The loving are the daring. 



\ 



A MAN INSPIRED OF GOD 333 

Though he was a party leader, he was a typical 
and patriotic American, in whom even his ene- 
mies might have found something to respect and 
admire. But it could not be so. He committed 
one grievous offence; he dared to think and he 
was not afraid to speak; he was far in advance 
of his party and his time; and men are slow to 
forgive what they do not readily understand. 

Yet, all the while that the waves of passion 
were breaking against his sturdy figure, reared 
above the dead level, as a lone oak upon a sandy 
beach, not one harsh word rankled in his heart 
to sour the milk of human kindness that, like a 
perennial spring from the gnarled roots of some 
majestic tree, flowed thence. He would smooth 
over a rough place in his official intercourse with 
a funny story fitting the case in point, and they 
called him a trifler. He would round off a logi- 
cal argument with a familiar example, hitting 
the nail squarely on the head and driving it home, 
and they called him a buffoon. Big wigs and 
little wigs were agreed that he lowered the dig- 
nity of debate; as if debates were intended to 
mystify, and not to clarify truth. Yet he went 
on and on, and never backward, until his time 
was come, when his genius, fully ripened, rose 
to emergencies. Where did he get his style? 
Ask Shakespeare and Burns where they got their 
style. Where did he get his grasp upon affairs 
and his knowledge of men? Ask the Lord God 
who created miracles in Luther and Bonaparte ! 

What was the mysterious power of this mys- 
terious man, and whence? His was the genius 
of common sense ; of common sense in action ; of 
common sense in thought ; of common sense en- 
riched by experience and unhindered by fear. 



334 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

"He was a common man," says his friend, 
Joshua Speed, ''expanded into giant proportions ; 
well acquainted with the people, he placed his 
hand on the beating pulse of the nation, judged 
of its disease, and was ready with a remedy.'* 
Inspired he was truly, as Shakespeare was in- 
spired; as Mozart was inspired; as Burns was 
inspired; each, like him, sprung directly from 
the people. 

I look into the crystal globe that, slowly turn- 
ing, tells the story of his life, and I see a little 
heart-broken boy, weeping by the outstretched 
form of a dead mother, then bravely, nobly 
trudging a hundred miles to obtain her Christian 
biirial. I see this motherless lad growing to 
manhood amid scenes that seem to lead to noth- 
ing but abasement ; no teachers ; no books ; no 
chart, except his own untutored mind ; no com- 
pass, except his own undisciplined will; no light, 
save light from Heaven ; yet, like the caravel of 
Columbus, struggling on and on through the 
trough of the sea, always toward the destined 
land. I see the full-grown man, stalwart and 
brave, an athlete in activity of movement and 
strength of limb, yet vexed by weird dreams 
and visions; of life, of love, of religion, some- 
times verging on despair. I see the mind, grown 
at length as robust as the body, throw off these 
phantoms of the imagination and give itself 
wholly to the workaday uses of the world ; the 
rearing of children; the earning of bread; the 
multiplied duties of life. I see the party leader, 
self-confident in conscious rectitude ; original, 
because it was not his nature to follow ; potent, 
because he was fearless, pursuing his convictions 
with earnest zeal, and urging them upon his fel- 



A MAN INSPIRED OF GOD 335 

lows with the resources of an oratory which was 
hardly more impressive than it was many-sided. 
I see him, the preferred among his fellows, as- 
cend the eminence reserved for him, and him 
alone of all the statesmen of the time, amid the 
derision of opponents and the distrust of sup- 
porters, yet unawed and unmoved, because thor- 
oughly equipped to meet the emergency. The 
same being, from first to last; the poor child 
weeping over a dead mother; the great chief 
sobbing amid the cruel horrors of war ; flinching 
never from duty, nor changing his lifelong ways 
of dealing with the stern realities which pressed 
upon him and hurried him onward. And, last 
scene of all, that ends this strange, eventful his- 
tory, I see him lying dead there in the Capitol 
of the nation to which he had rendered ''the last 
full measure of devotion," the flag of his coun- 
try around him, the world in mourning, and, 
asking myself how could any man have hated 
that man, I ask you, how can any man refuse 
his homage to his memory? Surely, he was one 
of God's own; not in any sense a creature of 
circumstance or accident. Recurring to the doc- 
trine of inspiration, I say, again and again, he 
was inspired of God, and I cannot see how any 
one who believes in that doctrine can believe him 
as anything else. 

From Caesar to Bismarck and Gladstone the 
world has had its statesmen and its soldiers — 
men who rose from obscurity to eminence and 
power step by step, through a series of geometric 
progression as it were, each advancement follow- 
ing in regular order one after the other, the whole 
obedient to well-established and well-understood 
laws of cause and effect. They were not what 



336 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

we call ''men of destiny." They were "men of 
the time." They were men whose careers had a 
beginning, a middle, and an end, rounding off 
lives with histories, full it may be of interesting 
and exciting event, but comprehensive and com- 
prehensible; simple, clear, complete. 

The inspired ones are fewer. Whence their 
emanation, where and how they got their power, 
by what rule they lived, moved, and had their 
being, we know not. There is no explication to 
their lives. They rose from shadow and they 
went in mist. We see them, feel them, but we 
know them not. They came, God's word upon 
their lips ; they did their office, God's mantle 
about them ; and they vanished, God's holy light 
between the world and them, leaving behind a 
memory, half mortal and half myth. From first 
to last they were the creations of some special 
Providence, baffling the wit of man to fathom, 
defeating the machinations of the world, the 
flesh, and the devil, until their work was done, 
then passing from the scene as mysteriously as 
they had come upon it. 

Tried by this standard, where shall we find 
an example so impressive as Abraham Lincoln, 
whose career might be chanted by a Greek chorus 
as at once the prelude and the epilogue of the 
most imperial theme of modern times? 

Born as lowly as the Son of God, in a hovel ; 
reared in penury, squalor, with no gleam of light 
or fair surrounding; without graces, actual or 
acquired ; without name or fame or official train- 
ing; it was reserved for this strange being, late 
in life, to be snatched from obscurity, raised to 
supreme command at a supreme moment, and 
intrusted with the destiny of a nation. 



A MAN INSPIRED OF GOD 337 

The great leaders of his party, the most expe- 
rienced and accomphshed pubhc men of the day, 
were made to stand aside ; were sent to the rear, 
while this fantastic figure was led by unseen 
hands to the front and given the reins of power. 
It is immaterial whether we were for him or 
against him ; wholly immaterial. That, during 
four years, carrying with them such a weight of 
responsibility as the world never witnessed be- 
fore, he filled the vast space allotted him in the 
eyes and actions of mankind, is to say that he 
w^as inspired of God, for nowhere else could he 
have acquired the wisdom and the virtue. 

Where did Shakespeare get his genius? 
Where did Mozart get his music? Whose hand 
smote the lyre of the Scottish ploughman, and 
stayed the life of the German priest? God, 
God, and God alone ; and as surely as these were 
raised up by God, inspired by God, was Abra- 
ham Lincoln ; and a thousand years hence, no 
drama, no tragedy, no epic poem will be filled 
with greater wonder, or be followed by mankind 
with deeper feeling than that which tells the 
story of his hfe and death. 



ADDITIONAL LINCOLN 
STORIES 



In inventing stories and skill in telling them 
Mr. Lincoln was the acknowledged leader 
among his associates. The habit of story-telling, 
early formed, became part of his nature, and, as 
seen in the narrative of his life, he gave free 
rein to it, even when the fate of the nation 
seemed to be trembling in the balance. ''Some 
eight or ten days after the first battle of Bull 
Run," says George W. Julian, "when Washing- 
ton was utterly demoralized by its result, I 
called upon him at the White House, in company 
with a few friends, and was amazed when, re- 
ferring to something which had been said by 
one of the company about the battle which was 
so disastrous to the Union forces, he remarked, 
in his usual quiet manner, 'That reminds me of 
a story/ which he told in a manner so humorous 
as to indicate that he was free from care and 
apprehension. This to me was surprising. I 
could not then understand how the President 
could feel like telling a story when Washing- 
ton was in danger of being captured, and the 
whole North was dismayed ; and I left the 
White House with the feeling that I had been 
mistaken in Mr. Lincoln's character, and that 
his election might prove to have been a fatal 
mistake. 

"This feeling was changed from day to day 



ADDITIONAL LINCOLN STORIES 339 

as the war went on ; but it was not entirely over- 
come until I went to Washington in the spring 
of 1863, and as an officer of the Government was 
permitted to have free intercourse with him. I 
then perceived that my estimate of him before 
his election was well grounded, and that he pos- 
sessed even higher qualities than I had given 
him credit for; that he was a man of sound judg- 
ment, great singleness and tenacity of purpose, 
and extraordinary sagacity; that story-telling 
was to him a safety-valve, and that he indulged 
in it, not only for the pleasure it afforded him, 
but for a temporary relief from oppressing 
cares; that the habit had been so cultivated that 
he could make a story illustrate a sentiment and 
give point to an argument. Many of his stories 
were as apt and instructive as the best of ^sop's 
fables. . . . 

"Senator Lane told me that when he heard a 
story that pleased him he took a memorandum 
of it, and filed it away among his papers. This 
was probably true. At any rate, by some method 
or other, his supply seemed inexhaustible, and 
always aptly available. He entered into the en- 
joyment of his stories with all his heart, and 
completely lived over again the delight he had 
experienced in telling them on previous occa- 
sions. When he told a particularly good story, 
and the time came to laugh, he would some- 
times throw his left foot across his right knee, 
and clenching his foot with both hands and 
bending forward, his whole frame seemed to be 
convulsed with the effort to give expression to 
his sensations. His laugh was like that of the 
hero of Sartor Resartus, 'a laugh of the whole 
man, from head to heel.' I believe his anec- 



340 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

dotes were his great solace and safeguard in sea- 
sons of severe mental depression." 

LINCOLN CLEAN-MINDED 

*'Dr. Holland," says F. B, Carpenter, "in his 
Life of Abraham Lincoln, I regret to observe, 
has thought it worth while to notice the reports, 
which in one way and another have obtained 
circulation, that the President habitually in- 
dulged, in ordinary conversation, in a class of 
objectionable stories. 

"Mr. Lincoln, I am convinced, has been 
greatly wronged in this respect. Every foul- 
mouthed man in the country gave currency to 
the slime and filth of his own imagination by 
attributing it to the President. It is but simple 
justice to his memory that I should state that, 
during the entire period of my stay in Washing- 
ton, after witnessing his intercourse with nearly 
all classes of men, embracing governors, sena- 
tors, members of Congress, officers of the army, 
and intimate friends, I cannot recollect to have 
heard him relate a circumstance to any of them 
which would have been out of place uttered in 
a ladies' drawing-room. And this testimony is 
not unsupported by that of others, well entitled 
to consideration. Dr. Stone, his family physi- 
cian, came in one day to see my studies. Sitting 
in front of that of the President — with whom he 
did not sympathize politically — he remarked, 
with much feeling: 

" *It is the province of a physician to probe 
deeply the interior lives of men ; and I affirm 
that Mr. Lincoln is the purest hearted man with 
whom I ever came in contact.' 



ADDITIONAL LINCOLN STORIES 341 

''Secretary Seward, who of the Cabinet offi- 
cers was most intimate with the President, ex- 
pressed the same sentiment in still stronger lan- 
guage. He once said to the Rev. Dr. Bellows: 

" 'Mr. Lincoln is the best man I ever knew!' " 



HIS WIT AND SATIRE 

''Those who accuse Lincoln of frivolity," de- 
clares David R. Locke (' 'Petroleum V. Nasby"), 
"never knew him. I never saw a more thought- 
ful face. I never saw a more dignified face. He 
had humor of which he was totally unconscious, 
but it was not frivolity. He said wonderfully 
witty things, but never from a desire to be witty. 
His wit was entirely illustrative. He used it 
because, and only because, at times he could say 
more in this way, and better illustrate the idea 
with which he was pregnant. He never cared 
how he made a point so that he made it, and he 
never told a story for the mere sake of telling a 
story. When he did it, it was for the purpose of 
illustrating and making clear a point. He was es- 
sentially epigrammatic and parabolic. He was 
a master of satire, which was at times as blunt 
as a meat-ax, and at others as keen as a razor, 
but it was always kindly, except when some hor- 
rible injustice was its inspiration, and then it 
was terrible. Weakness he was never ferocious 
with, but intentional wickedness he never spared. 

"In this interview," says the narrator, "the 
name came up of a recently deceased politician 
of Illinois, whose undeniable merit was blem- 
ished by overweening vanity. His funeral was 
largely attended. 

" Tf General Blank had known how big a 



342 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

funeral he would have,' said Mr. Lincoln, 'he 
would have died years ago.' " 

THE SUPERLATIVE DEGREE 

Lincoln made his first appearance in society 
in Springfield, Illinois. It was not a prepossess- 
ing figure which he cut in a ballroom, but still 
he was occasionally found there. Miss Mary 
Todd, who afterward became his wife, was the 
magnet which drew the tall, awkward young 
man from his den. One evening Lincoln ap- 
proached Miss Todd, and said, in his peculiar 
idiom : 

"Miss Todd, I should like to dance with you 
the worst way." 

The young woman accepted the inevitable, and 
hobbled around the room with him. When she 
returned to her seat, one of her companions 
asked, mischievously : 

''Well, Mary, did he 'dance with you the worst 
way ?' " 

"Yes," replied Miss Todd, "the very worst!" 

"comparisons are odorous" 

Lincoln was, naturally enough, much sur- 
prised one day when a man of rather forbidding 
countenance drew a revolver and thrust the 
weapon almost into his face. 

"What seems to be the matter?" inquired Lin- 
coln, looking at him with all the self-possession 
he could muster. 

"Well," replied the stranger, who did not ap- 
pear to be at all excited, "some years ago I 
swore an oath that if I ever came across an 



ADDITIONAL LINCOLN STORIES 343 

uglier man than myself, I'd shoot him on the 
spot." 

On hearing this Lincoln's expression lost all 
suggestion of anxiety. He said to the stranger: 

"Shoot me, then, for if I am an uglier man 
than you I don't want to live." 



A SEVEN-FOOT WHISTLE ON A FIVE-FOOT BOILER 

Senator Voorhees told the following story of 
Lincoln's speech to the jury in answer to an 
oratorical lawyer : 

"I recall one story Lincoln told during the 
argument in a lawsuit. The lawyer on the other 
side was a good deal of a glib talker, but not 
reckoned as deeply profound or much of a 
thinker. He was rather reckless and irrespon- 
sible in his speechmaking also, and would say 
anything to a jury which happened to enter his 
head. Lincoln in his address to the jury, refer- 
ring to all these, said: 

'' 'My friend on the other side is all right, or 
would be all right, were it not for the physico- 
mental peculiarity I am about to explain: 

'' 'His habit — of which you have witnessed a 
very painful specimen in his argument to you in 
this case — of reckless assertion and statement 
without grounds, need not be imputed to him as 
a moral fault or blemish. He can't help it. For 
reasons which, gentlemen of the jury, you and I 
have not time to study here, as deplorable as 
they are surprising, the oratory of the gentleman 
completely suspends all action of his mind. The 
moment he begins to talk his mental operations 
cease. I never knew of but one thing which 
compared with my friend in this particular. 



344 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

That was a steamboat. Back in the days when 
I performed my part as a keel boatman I made 
the acquaintance of a trifling Httle steamboat 
which used to bustle and puff and wheeze about 
in the Sangamon River. It had a five-foot boiler 
and a seven-foot whistle, and every time it 
whistled the boat stopped.' " 



STORY OF ANOTHER STORY 

Returning from one of his trips (on the 
Eighth Circuit) late one night, Mr. Lincoln dis- 
mounted from his horse at the familiar corner 
and then turned to go into the house, but stopped 
—a perfectly unknown structure stood before 
him. 

Surprised, he went across the way and 
knocked at a neighbor's door. The family had 
retired, and so called out: 

"Who's there?" 

**Abe Lincoln," was the reply. *T am looking 
for my house. I thought it was across the way, 
but when I went away a few weeks ago there 
was only a one-story house there, and now it is 
two. I must be lost." 

His neighbors then explained that Mrs. Lin- 
coln had added another story during his absence. 
Mr. Lincoln laughed and went to his remodeled 
house. 

A SOCRATIC EXAMINATION 

There was an ignorant man who once applied 
to President Lincoln for the post of Doorkeeper 
to the House. This man had no right to ask 
Lincoln for anything. It was necessary to re- 
pulse him. But Lincoln repulsed him gently and 



ADDITIONAL LINCOLN STORIES 345 

whimsically, without hurting his feelings, in this 
way: 

"So you want to be Doorkeeper to the House, 
eh?" 

''Yes, Mr. President." 

''Well, have you ever been a doorkeeper? 
Have you ever had any experience in doorkeep- 
ing?" 

"Well, no — no actual experience, sir." 

"Any theoretical experience? Any instruc- 
tions in the duties and ethics of doorkeeping ?" 

"Urn— no." 

"Have you ever attended lectures on door- 
keeping?" 

"No, sir." 

"Have you read any text-books on the sub- 
ject?" 

"No." 

"Have you conversed with any one who has 
read such a book ?" 

" No, sir; I'm afraid not, sir." 

"Well, then, my friend, don't you see that you 
haven't a single qualification for this important 
post?" said Lincoln, in a reproachful tone. 

"Yes, I do," said the applicant, and he took 
leave humbly, almost gratefully. 

"l don't care IF YOU WILL FIGHT FOR THE 

country" 

"I called on Lincoln at the White House," 
said General Butler, "to make acknowledgments 
for my appointment as a Major-General. When 
he handed me the commission, with some kindly 
words of compliment, I replied : 

"'I do not know whether I ought to accept 



346 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

this. I received my orders to prepare my bri- 
gade to march to Washington while trying a 
cause to a jury. I stated the fact to the court 
and asked that the case might be continued, 
which was at once consented to, and I left, to 
come here the second morning after, my business 
in utter confusion.' He said: 

*' 'I guess we both wish we were back trying 
cases,' with a quizzical look upon his counte- 
nance. 

'*I said : 'Besides, j\Ir. President, you may not 
be aware that I was the Breckinridge candidate 
for Governor of my State in the last campaign, 
and did all I could to prevent your election.' 

" 'All the better,' said he. 'I hope your ex- 
ample will bring many of the same sort with 
you.' 

'* 'But,' I answered, 'I do not think that I can 
support the measures of your Administration, 
Mr. President.' 

" 'I do not care whether you do or not,' was 
the reply, "if you will fight for the country." 

THE SANGAMON BARBER 

The following story was told by General Hor- 
ace Porter in a speech at the Republican Club 
in New York. 

"Lincoln's stories possessed the true geometri- 
cal requisites of excellence. They were never 
too long and never too broad. He never forgot 
a point. A sentinel who was pacing near a 
camp-fire while Lincoln was visiting the field, 
listening to the stories he told, made the phil- 
osophical remark that that man had a mighty 
powerful memory but an awful poor forgettory. 



ADDITIONAL LINCOLN STORIES 347 

He did not tell a story for the sake of the anec- 
dote but to point a moral or to clinch a fact. I 
do not know a more apt illustration than that 
which fell from his lips the last time I ever heard 
him converse. 

"We were discussing the subject of England's 
assistance to the South and how after the col- 
lapse of the Confederacy England would find she 
had aided it but little and only injured herself. 
He said, *That reminds me of a barber in Sanga- 
mon County. He had just gone to bed when a 
stranger came along and said he must be shaved, 
that he had a four days' beard on his face and 
was going to a ball and that beard must come 
off. Well, the barber reluctantly got up and 
dressed and seated the man in a chair with the 
back so low that every time he bore down on him 
he came near dislocating his victim's neck. He 
began by lathering his face, including his nose, 
eyes, and ears, stropped his razor on his boot, 
and then made a strike at the man's countenance 
as if he had practised mowing on a stubble-field. 

" 'He made a broad swath across the right 
cheek, carrying away the beard and two warts. 
The man in the chair ventured to remark, ''You 
appear to make everything level as you go." 
Said the barber, "Yes, and if this handle don't 
break I guess I will get away with what there 
is there." 

" 'The man's cheeks were so hollow that the 
barber could not get down into the valleys with 
the razor, and the ingenious idea occurred to him 
to stick his finger in the man's mouth and press 
out the cheeks. Finally he cut clear through the 
cheek and into his own finger. He pulled the 
finger out of the man's mouth, snapped the blood 



348 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

off, glared at him and said, 'There, you lantern- 
jawed cuss, you have made me cut my own 
finger." 

*' 'Now,' said Lincoln, 'England will find that 
she has got the South into a pretty bad scrape 
by trying to administer to her, and in the end 
she will find that she has only cut her own 
finger.' " 

GENERAL GRANT's LINCOLN STORIES 

To General Grant history is indebted for the 
two stories that next follow, the applications of 
which the General makes clear. They are pre- 
served in Reminiscences of Abraham Lincoln, 
edited by Allen Thorndike Rice. 



I 

Just after receiving my commission as Lieu- 
tenant-General, the President called me aside to 
speak to me privately. After a brief reference 
to the military situation, he said he thought he 
could illustrate what he wanted to say by a 
story, which he related as follows: "At one time 
there was a great war among the animals, and 
one side had great difficulty in getting a com- 
mander who had sufficient confidence in himself. 
Finally, they found a monkey, by the name of 
Jocko, who said that he thought he could com- 
mand their army if his tail could be made a 
little longer. So they got more tail and spliced 
it on to his caudal appendage. He looked at it 
admiringly, and then thought he ought to have 
a little more still. This was added, and again he 



ADDITIONAL LINCOLN STORIES 349 

called for more. The splicing process was re- 
peated many times, until they had coiled Jocko's 
tail around the room, filling all the space. Still 
he called for more tail, and, there being no other 
place to coil it, they began wrapping it around 
his shoulders. He continued his call for more, 
and they kept on winding the additional tail 
about him until its weight broke him down." 

I saw the point, and, rising from my chair, re- 
plied : ''Mr. President, I will not call for more 
assistance unless I find it impossible to do with 
what I already have." 



II 

Upon one occasion, when the President was at 
my headquarters at City Point, I took him to 
see the work that had been done on the Dutch 
Gap Canal. After taking him around and show- 
ing him all the points of interest, explaining how, 
in blowing up one portion of the work that was 
being excavated, the explosion had thrown the 
material back into, and filled up, a part already 
completed, he turned to me and said : "Grant, do 
you know what this reminds me of? Out in 
Springfield, Illinois, there was a blacksmith 

named . One day, when he did not have 

much to do, he took a piece of soft iron that had 
been in his shop for some time, and for which 
he had no special use, and, starting up his fire, 
began to heat it. When he got it hot he carried 
it to the anvil and began to hammer it, rather 
thinking he would weld it into an agricultural 
implement. He pounded away for some time 
until he got it fashioned into some shape, when 



350 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

he discovered that the iron would not hold out 
to complete the implement he had in mind. He 
then put it back into the forge, heated it up 
again, and recommenced hammering, with an 
ill-defined notion that he would make a claw- 
hammer, but after a time he came to the con- 
clusion that there was more iron there than was 
needed to form a hammer. Again he heated it, 
and thought he would make an ax. After ham- 
mering and welding it into shape, knocking the 
oxidized iron off in flakes, he concluded there 
was not enough of the iron left to make an ax 
that would be of any use. He was now getting 
tired and a little disgusted at the result of his 
various essays. So he filled his forge full of 
coal, and, after placing the iron in the centre of 
the heap, took the bellows and worked up a tre- 
mendous blast, bringing the iron to a white heat. 
Then with his tongs he lifted it from the bed 
of coals, and thrusting it into a tub of water near 
by, exclaimed with an oath, 'Well, if I can't 
make anything else of you, I will make a fizzle, 
anyhow.' " 

I replied that I was afraid that was about what 
we had done with the Dutch Gap Canal. 

MOONSHINE EVIDENCE 

One of the last criminal cases Lincoln tried 
was undertaken for a humble friend, in the midst 
of absorbing political activities. The story has 
been often told, and is given in the following 
manner by James Morgan. 

The son of that Jack Armstrong, the champion 
of Clary's Grove, whose loyal friendship Lin- 
coln had won by beating him in open contest at 



ADDITIONAL LINCOLN STORIES 351 

New Salem, was on trial for killing a man. Jack 
was in his grave, but his widow turned to Lin- 
coln to save her boy. He gratefully remembered 
that the poor woman had been almost a mother 
to him in his friendless days and that her cabin 
had been his home when he had no other. He 
laid aside all else now and went to her aid. The 
defendant's guilt was extremely doubtful. 

The chief witness testified that he saw the boy 
strike the fatal blow and that the scene occurred 
about eleven o'clock at night. Lincoln inquired 
how he could have seen so clearly at that late 
hour. 

"By the moonlight," the witness answered. 

''Was there light enough to see everything 
that happened?" Lincoln asked. 

"The moon was about in the same place the 
sun would be at ten o'clock in the morning and 
nearly full," the man on the stand replied. 

Almost instantly Lincoln held out a calendar. 
By this he showed that on the night in question, 
the moon was only slightly past its first quarter, 
that it set within an hour after the fatal occur- 
rence, and that it could, therefore, have shed 
little or no light on the scene of the alleged mur- 
der. The crowded court was electrified by the 
disclosure. 

"Hannah," whispered Lincoln as he turned to 
the mother, **Bill will be cleared before sun- 
down." 

Then, addressing the jury, he told them how 
he had come to the boy's defence, not as a hired 
attorney, but to discharge a debt of friendship 
incurred in the days when friends were few. 
With genuine feeling he summoned up the pic- 
ture of the simple past, the old log cabin of the 



352 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

Armstrongs, where the good woman now beside 
him in her silvered locks had taken him in, and 
given him food and shelter, and how she mended 
his tattered clothes while he rocked Bill to sleep 
in the cradle. 

Every member of the jury loved Lincoln and 
honored him. With tears of sympathy flowing 
down their cheeks, they gladly gave him the ver- 
dict which, with his whole heart, he begged from 
their hands. 

WHOLESALE SLAUGHTER 

Returning from off the circuit once Lincoln 
said to Herndon: 

''Billy, I heard a good story while I was up 
in the country. Judge D was compliment- 
ing the landlord on the excellence of his beef. 
*I am surprised,' he said, 'that you have such 
good beef. You must have to kill a whole crit- 
ter when you want any.' 

" 'Yes,' said the landlord, 'we never kill less 
than a whole critter.' " 

"dead," yet speaking 

"Fellow-Citizens: My friend. Judge Doug- 
las, made the startling announcement to-day that 
the Whigs are all dead. 

"If that be so, fellow-citizens, you will now 
experience the novelty of hearing a speech from 
a dead man; and I suppose you might properly 
say, in the language of the old hymn : 

" 'Hark ! from the tombs a doleful sound.' " 



ADDITIONAL LINCOLN STORIES 353 



TAKING SIDES 

A member of the church, at a reception, closed 
his remarks with the pious hope that "the Lord 
is on our side." 

"I am not at all concerned about that," com- 
mented the President, "for we know that the 
Lord is always on the side of the right. But it 
is my constant anxiety and prayer that I and this 
nation should be on the Lord's side." 



HIS ONLY CHANCE 

The name of a most virulent and dishonest 
official was mentioned — one who, though very 
brilliant, was very bad. 

"It's a big thing for Blank," said Lincoln, 
*'that there is such a thing as death-bed repent- 
ance." 

FOOLING THE PEOPLE 

Lincoln was a strong believer in the virtue of 
dealing honestly with the people. 

"If you once forfeit the confidence of your 
fellow-citizens," he said to a caller at the White 
House, "you can never regain their respect and 
esteem. 

"It is true you may fool all the people some of 
the time ; you can even fool some of the people 
all the time ; but you can't fool all of the people 
all the time." 

PEACE WITH HONOR 

President Lincoln was at all times an advocate 
of peace, provided it could be obtained honor- 
ably and with credit to the United States. As to 



354 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

the cause of the Civil War, which side of Mason 
and Dixon's Hne was responsible for it, who fired 
the first shots, who were the aggressors, etc., 
Lincoln did not seem to bother about ; he wanted, 
above all things, to preserve the Union. To 
illustrate his feeling in the matter, once, when 
it was under discussion, he said : 

*'Now this reminds me of a story I heard once, 
when I lived in Illinois. A vicious bull in a pas- 
ture took after everybody who tried to cross the 
lot, and one day the neighbor of the owner was 
the victim. This man was a speedy fellow and 
got to a friendly tree ahead of the bull, but not 
in time to climb the tree. So he led the enraged 
animal a merry race around the tree, finally suc- 
ceeding in getting the bull by the tail. 

''The bull, being at a disadvantage, not able 
either to catch the man or release his tail, was 
mad enough to eat nails ; he dug up the earth 
with his feet, scattered gravel all around, bel- 
lowed until you could hear him for two miles or 
more, and at length broke into a dead run, the 
man hanging onto his tail all the time. 

''While the bull, much out of temper, was leg- 
ging it to the best of his ability, his tormentor, 
still clinging to the tail, asked, 'Darn you, who 
commenced this fuss?' 

"It's our duty to settle this fuss at the earliest 
possible moment, no matter who commenced it. 
That's my idea of it." 

INSCRIPTION FOR GREENBACKS 

At a Cabinet meeting once the advisability of 
putting on greenbacks a legend similar to the 
"In God We Trust" on the silver coins was dis- 



ADDITIONAL LINCOLN STORIES 355 

cussed, and the President was asked what his 
view was. He repHed : 

"If you are going to put a legend on the 
greenback, I would suggest that of Peter and 
John : 'Silver and gold have I none, but such as 
I have give I thee/ " [Acts iii, 6.] 

''something that everybody can take'^ 

The President was feeling indisposed, and had 
sent for his physician, who soon informed him 
that his trouble was varioloid, or a mild form of 
smallpox. 

"They're all over me. Is it contagious?" 
asked Mr. Lincoln. 

"Yes," answered the doctor, "very, indeed." 

"Oh !" said a visitor who had called to see the 
President, "I can't stop." 

"Don't be in a hurry, sir," said the President, 
placidly. 

"Thank you, sir — I'll call again !" the visitor 
called back as he left abruptly. 

"Some people," exclaimed the President, smil- 
ing as he looked after the retreating caller, "some 
people do not take very well to my Proclama- 
tion, but now, I am happy to say, I have some- 
thing that everybody can take." 

END FOR END 

Stories are more interesting than logic and far 
more effective with the average audience, and 
Lincoln's juries usually heard something from 
him in the way of an apt comparison or illustra- 
tion which impressed his point upon their minds. 

On one occasion when he was defending a 



356 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

case of assault and battery it was proved that the 
plaintiff had been the aggressor, but the oppos- 
ing counsel argued that the defendant might 
have protected himself without inflicting injuries 
on his assailant. 

''That reminds me of the man who was at- 
tacked by a farmer's dog, which he killed with 
a pitchfork," commented Lincoln. 

"'What made you kill my dog?' demanded 
the farmer. 

" 'What made him try to bite me?' retorted the 
offender. 

" 'But why didn't you go at him with the other 
end of the pitchfork?' persisted the farmer. 

" 'Well, why didn't he come at me with his 
other end?' was the retort." 



In the campaign of 1852, Lincoln, in reply to 
Douglas's speech, wherein he spoke of confidence 
in Providence, replied: 

"Let us stand by our candidate (General 
Scott) as faithfully as he has always stood by 
our country, and I much doubt if we do not per- 
ceive a slight abatement of Judge Douglas's con- 
fidence in Providence, as well as the people. 

"I suspect that confidence is not more firmly 
fixed with the Judge than it was with the old 
woman whose horse ran away with her in the 
buggy. She said she 'trusted in Providence till 
the britchen broke,' and then she 'didn't know 
what on airth to do !' " 



ADDITIONAL LINCOLN STORIES 357 



THE DOG AND THE BITE 

Lincoln's quarrel with Shields was his last 
personal encounter. In later years it became his 
duty to give an official reprimand to a young 
officer who had been court-martialed for a quar- 
rel with one of his associates. The reprimand 
was probably the gentlest on record : 

''Quarrel not at all. No man resolved to make 
the most of himself can spare time for personal 
contention. Still less can he afford to take all 
the consequences, including the vitiating of his 
temper and the loss of self-control. Yield larger 
things to which you can show no more than 
equal right ; and yield lesser ones, though clearly 
your own. 

''Better give your path to a dog than be bitte:i 
by him in contesting for the right. Even killing 
the dog would not cure the bite." 

EXPENSIVE MULES 

The generals of the army were not always 
pleased to have Lincoln call them so familiarly, 
"my generals." 

Walking up Pennsylvania Avenue one evening, 
on the road to the White House, several mem- 
bers of Congress were hailed by a courier who 
had just dashed across the Long Bridge. He 
told them the news he was taking to the War 
Department. In the gray of that very morning 
a Confederate raid in Falls Church, a little ham- 
let a dozen miles away, had surprised and cap- 
tured a brigadier-general, and twelve army 
mules, and had got into the enemy's lines before 
they could be recaptured. As they were going 



3S8 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

to the Executive Chamber, the Congressmen 
thought they would tell Mr. Lincoln the news in 
advance. He said, instantly, on hearing it : 

''How unfortunate! I can fill his place with 
one of my generals in five minutes, but those 
mules cost us $200 apiece." 

OUTSTRIPPING THE STAR 

One who was designated by the Secretary of 
War as a sort of special escort to accompany 
the President from Washington to Gettysburg 
upon the occasion of the first anniversary of the 
battle at that place, relates that at the appointed 
time he went to the White House, where he 
found the President's carriage at the door to 
take him to the station; but he was not ready. 
When he appeared it was rather late, and the 
escort, who felt a due sense of responsibility, 
remarked that he had no time to lose in going 
to the train. 

"Well," said the President, "I feel about that 
as the convict in one our Illinois towns felt when 
he was going to the gallows. As he passed along 
the road in custody of the sheriff, the people, 
eager to see the execution, kept crowding and 
pushing past him. At last he called out : 

" 'Boys, you needn't be in such a hurry to get 
ahead, there zvon't he any fun till I get there.' " 

A BARGAIN IS A BARGAIN 

Tad, as he was universally called, almost al- 
ways accompanied his father upon the various 
excursions down the Potomac. Once on the 
way to Fort Monroe, he became very trouble- 



ADDITIONAL LINCOLN STORIES 3 59 

some. The President was much engaged in con- 
versation with the party who accompanied him, 
and he at length said : 

''Tad, if you will be a good boy, and not dis- 
turb me any more till we get to Fort Monroe, I 
will give you a dollar." 

The hope of reward was effectual for a while 
in securing silence, but, boy-like. Tad soon for- 
got his promise, and was as noisy as ever. Upon 
reaching their destination, however, he said very 
promptly : 

''Father, I want my dollar." 

Mr. Lincoln turned to him with the Inquiry: 

"Tad, do you think you have earned it?" 

"Yes," was the sturdy reply. 

Mr. Lincoln looked at him half reproachfully 
for an instant, and then taking from his pocket 
a dollar note, he said : 

"Well, my son, at any rate I will keep my 
part of the bargain." 

"more light and less noise" 

"Wednesday, March 2 (1864)," says F. B. Car- 
penter, "I had an unusually long and interesting 
sitting from the President. . . . The news had 
been recently received of the disaster under Gen- 
eral Seymour in Florida. Many newspapers 
openly charged the President with having sent 
the expedition with primary reference to restor- 
ing the State in season to secure its vote at the 
forthcoming Baltimore convention. Mr. Lincoln 
was deeply wounded by these charges. ... A 
few days afterward an editorial appeared in the 
Neiv York Tribune, which was known not to 
favor Lincoln's renomination, entirely exoner- 



36o TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

ating him from blame. I took the article to him 
in his study, and he expressed much gratifi- 
cation at its candor. In connection with news- 
paper attacks he told, during the sitting, this 
istory : 

'' 'A traveler on the frontier found himself out 
of his reckoning one night in a most inhospitable 
region. A terrific thunderstorm came up, to add 
to his trouble. He floundered along until at 
length his horse gave out. The lightning af- 
forded him the only clew to his way, but the 
peals of thunder were frightful. One bolt, which 
seemed to crush the earth beneath him, brought 
him to his knees. By no means a praying man, 
his petition was short and to the point: 

*' ' "O Lord, if it's all the same to you, give 
us a little more light and a little less noise." ' " 

"punch's" advice reversed 

Critics have arraigned Mr. Lincoln for lack of 
dignity; and he used to acknowledge in reply, 
that he had never enjoyed a quarter's education 
in any dignity school whatever. While his West- 
ern training, so full as it had been of independent 
individuality, appeared to make the requirements 
of etiquette always chafe and gall him, we can 
imagine how astonished was Lord Lyons, the 
stately British Minister, when he presented the 
autograph letter from Queen Victoria, announ- 
cing, as is the custom of European monarchies, 
the marriage of the Prince of Wales, and adding 
that whatever response the President would 
make he would immediately transmit to his 
royal mistress. 

Mr. Lincoln responded instantly, by shaking 



ADDITIONAL LINCOLN STORIES 361 

the marriage announcement at the bachelor min- 
ister before him, saying: 

"Lyons, go thou and do likewise T' 

THE president's DIGNITY 

A cashiered officer persisted several times in 
presenting to the President a plea for his rein- 
statement and was finally told that even his own 
statement did not justify a rehearing. His final 
application being met with silence, he lost his 
temper and blurted out: 

"Well, Mr. President, I see that you are fully 
determined not to do me justice." 

Without evincing any emotion, Mr. Lincoln 
rose, laid some papers on the desk, and suddenly 
seizing the officer by the coat-collar, marched him 
to the door. After ejecting him into the hall, 
he said : 

*'Sir, I give you fair warning never to show 
yourself here again ! I can bear censure, but not 
insult." 

TEDIOUSNESS OF DETAIL 

So voluminous a report was made by a Con- 
gressional committee upon a new gun that the 
President pathetically said : 

"I should want a new lease of life to read this 
through. Why can't an investigating committee 
show a grain of common sense? If I send a 
man to buy a horse for me, I expect him to tell 
me that horse's points — not how many hairs he 
has in his tail." 



362 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 



HE THAT SHOWED MERCY 

A Union officer, in conversation one day, told 
this story: 

''The first week I was with my command there 
were twenty-four deserters sentenced by court- 
martial to be shot, and the warrants for their 
execution were sent to the President to be signed. 
He refused. I went to Washington and had an 
interview. I said: 

*' 'Mr. President, unless these men are made 
an example of, the army itself is in danger. 
Mercy to the few is cruelty to the many.' 

"He replied : 'Mr. General, there are already 
too many weeping widows in the United States. 
For God's sake don't ask me to add to the num- 
ber, for I won't do it!' " 



SYKES S DOG 

General Horace Porter tells the following 
amusing anecdote. 

Lincoln always enjoyed telling General Grant, 
after the two had become personally intimate, 
how the cross-roads wiseacres had criticised his 
campaigns. One day, after dwelling for some 
time on this subject, he said to Grant: 

"After Vicksburg I thought it was about time 
to shut down on this sort of thing, so one day, 
when a delegation came to see me and had spent 
half an hour in trying to show me the fatal 
mistake you had made in paroling Pemberton's 
army, and insisting that the rebels would vio- 
late their paroles and in less than a month con- 
front you again in the ranks, and have to be 
whipped all over again, I thought I should get 



ADDITIONAL LINCOLN STORIES 363 

rid of them best by telling them a story about 
Sykes's dog. 

" 'Have you ever heard about Sykes's yellow 
dog?' said I to the spokesman of the delegation. 
He said he hadn't. 

" 'Well, I must tell you about him,' said I. 
Sykes had a yellow dog he set great store by, 
but there were a lot of small boys around the 
village, and that's always a bad thing for dogs, 
you know. These boys didn't share Sykes's 
views, and they were not disposed to let the dog 
have a fair show. Even Sykes had to admit 
that the dog was getting unpopular; in fact it 
was soon seen that a prejudice was growing up 
against that dog that threatened to wreck all his 
future prospects in life. The boys, after medi- 
tating how they could get the best of him, finally 
fixed up a cartridge with a long fuse, put the car- 
tridge in a piece of meat, dropped the meat in 
the road in front of Sykes's door, and then 
perched themselves on a fence a good distance 
off with the end of the fuse in their hands. 
Then they whistled for the dog. When he came 
out he scented the bait, and bolted the meat, 
cartridge and all. The boys touched off the fuse 
with a cigar and in about a second a report came 
from that dog that sounded like a small clap of 
thunder. Sykes came bounding out of the house, 
and yelled : 

" * What's up ! Anything busted ?' 

'There was no reply except a snicker from the 
small boys roosting on the fence, but as Sykes 
looked up he saw the whole air filled with 
pieces of yellow dog. He picked up the big- 
gest piece he could find, a portion of the back 
with a part of the tail still hanging to it, and 



364 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

after turning it around and looking it all over 
he said : 

" 'Well, I guess he'll never be much account 
again — as a dog I' 

" 'And I guess Pemberton's forces will never 
be much account again — as an army!' 

''The delegation began looking around for 
their hats before I had quite got to the end of 
the story, and I was never bothered any more 
after that about superseding the commander of 
the Army of the Tennessee." 

SKILLET AND AX-HELVE 

"The strifes and jars in the Republican party 
at this time (1864)," says David R. Locke, "dis- 
turbed him more than anything else, but he 
avoided taking sides with any faction. ... I 
asked him why he did not take some pronounced 
position in one trying encounter between two 
very prominent Republicans. 

" 'I learned,' said he, 'a great many years ago, 
that in a fight between man and wife, a third 
party should never get between the woman's 
skillet and the man's ax-helve." 



COMPUTING THE ENEMY 

Toward the close of the great conflict, sur- 
mises upon the length of time to which the war 
might be protracted were based on estimates of 
the enemy's strength. On being asked, point- 
blank, how strong he deemed the Confederates 
to be, the President replied offhand: 

"They have some 1,200,000 in the field." 
"Is it possible! How did you find that out?" 



ADDITIONAL LINCOLN STORIES 365 

"Why," said Lincoln, ''every Union general I 
ever heard tell — when he was licked — says the 
rebels outnumbered him three or four to one ; 
now, we have at the present time about 400,000 
men, and three times that number would be 
1,200,000, wouldn't it?" 

"don't do it" 

One day Secretary Stanton came to him with 
a wrathful letter written to a Major-General 
who had accused him of favoritism. While 
Stanton was reading the letter, which was full 
of sharp retorts, Lincoln interrupted him with 
favorable comments such as : 

"That's right ; give it to him, Stanton !" — 
"Just what he deserves!" — "Prick him hard!" — 
"Score him!"— "That's first-rate!"— "Good for 
you!" — and so on. 

W^hile Stanton, much gratified, was folding up 
the letter and putting it into its envelope, the 
President asked him : 

"What are you going to do with it now?" 

"Why, send it, of course," replied Stanton, 
looking blank. 

"Don't do it," said Lincoln, laughing. 

"But you said it was Just what he deserved,'* 
demurred the Secretary. 

"Yes, I believe he does deserve it, but you 
don't want to send such a letter as that. Put 
it in the stove! That's the way I do when I have 
written a letter while I am mad. It is a good 
letter, and you have had a good time writing it, 
and you feel better, don't you ? It has done you 
good and answered its purpose. Now hum it!" 



366 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 



THE PRESIDENT-MAKER 

One day, a persevering office-seeker called on 
Mr. Lincoln, and, presuming on the activity he 
had shown in behalf of the party ticket, asserted 
as a reason why the office should be given him, 
that he had made Mr. Lincoln President. 

'*So you made me President, did you?" asked 
Mr. Lincoln with a twinkle in his eye. 

"I think I did," said the applicant. 

''Then a pretty mess you've got me into, that's 
all!" replied the President, and closed the dis- 
cussion. 

HIS OWN TAILOR 

One of the President's life-guard who was on 
duty early in 1865, saw much of Mr. Lincoln, 
day and night, for several months. 

Early one morning he tapped on the Presi- 
dent's bedroom door. To his surprise he found 
the President of the United States, in dishabille 
and carpet slippers, sewing a button on his trou- 
sers. With a characteristic twinkle, Mr. Lincoln 
jauntily exclaimed : 

''All right. Just wait a minute while I repair 
damages." 

A COUNTER-STROKE 

Judge Douglas closed a speech with a very 
bitter attack upon Lincoln's career. He said that 
Lincoln had tried everything and had always been 
a failure. He had tried farming, and had failed 
at that — had tried flatboating, and had failed at 
that — had tried school-teaching, and had failed at 
that — had sold liquor in a saloon, and had failed 
at that — had tried law, and had failed at that — 



ADDITIONAL LINCOLN STORIES 367 

and now he had gone into poHtics, and was 
doomed to make the worst faihire of all. "That 
is the man," said Judge Douglas, ''who wants my 
place in the Senate. You don't know him in the 
northern part of the State so well as we do who 
live in the southern part." 

Lincoln seemed to be greatly amused. At 
length he rose to reply. He came forward and 
said that he was much obliged to Judge Douglas 
for the very accurate history that he had taken 
the trouble to compile. It was all true — every 
word of it. *'I have," said Lincoln, "worked on 
a farm; I have split rails; I have worked on a 
flatboat; I have tried to practise law. There is 
just one thing that Judge Douglas forgot to re- 
late. He says that I sold liquor over a counter. 
He forgot to tell you that, while I was one side 
of the counter, the Judge was always on the 
other side." 

That allusion to Judge Douglas's well-known 
infirmity set the whole audience wild. The peo- 
ple rent the heavens with their shouts. It was 
some time before quiet was restored. Then Mr. 
Lincoln delivered one of those masterly orations 
that made him famous. 



BLESSED BE NOTHING 

A reverend gentleman of prominence was pre- 
sented to the President, who resignedly had a 
chair placed for him, and with patient awaiting 
said : 

"My dear sir, I am now ready to hear what 
you have to say." 

"Why, bless you, Mr. President," stammered 
the other, with more apprehension than his host, 



368 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

"1 have nothing to say. I only came to pay my 
respects." 

''Is that all?" exclaimed the escaped victim, 
springing up to take the minister's two hands 
with gladness. "It is a relief to find a clergy- 
man — or any other man, for that matter — who 
has nothing to say. I thought you had come to 
preach to me, or to ask for an office." 

"my Maryland" 

In April, 1861, a deputation of sympathizers 
with secession had the boldness to call on Presi- 
dent Lincoln and demand a cessation of hostili- 
ties until convening of Congress, threatening that 
seventy-five thousand Marylanders would contest 
the passage of troops over their soil. 

"I presume," quietly replied Mr. Lincoln, "that 
there is room enough in her soil for seventy-five 
thousand graves?" 

THE BULL RUNNERS 

Shortly after the rout of Bull Run, the par- 
ticipants in the panic began to try to palliate the 
disaster. The President, listening with sarcasm 
in his expression, remarked: 

"So it is your notion now that we licked the 
rebels and then ran away !" 

''a good state to move from" 

Thurlow Weed, prominent wire-puller, pre- 
sented as a preferable puppet to Montgomery 
Blair his choice, Henry Winter Davis, upon 
which the President said : 



ADDITIONAL LINCOLN STORIES 369 

"Davis? Judge David Davis put you up to 
this. He has Davis on the brain. A Maryland 
man who wants to get out ! Maryland must be 
a good State to move from. Weed, did you ever 
hear, in this connection, of the witness in court 
asked to state his age? He said sixty. As he 
was on the face of it much older, but persisted, 
the court admonished him, saying: 

" 'The court knows you to be older than 
sixty !' 

" 'Oh, I understand now,' owned up the old 
fellow. 'You are thinking of the ten years I 
spent in Maryland; that was so much time lost 
and did not count!'" 

NO INTERVENTION NEEDED 

April, 1862, closed brilliantly for the Union, 
as New Orleans was captured. General Porter 
Phelps issued a proclamation which freed the 
slaves. As on previous occasions, when this 
bomb was brought out, the President had di- 
rected its being stifled and reserved for his occa- 
sion, and there was wonder that he took no of- 
ficial notice of the premature flash. Taken to 
task by a friendly critic for his odd omission, he 
deigned to reply: 

"Well, I feel about it a good deal like that big, 
burly, good-natured canal laborer who had a lit- 
tle waspy bit of a wife, in the habit of beating 
him. One day she put him out of the house and 
switched him up and down the street. A friend 
met him a day or two after, and rebuked him 
with the words : 

" 'Tom, as you know, I have always stood 
up for you, but I am not going to do so any 



3 70 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

longer. Any man may stand for a bullyragging 
by his wife, but when he talces a switching from 
her right out on the pubUc highway, he deserves 
to be horsewhipped.' 

"Tom looked up with a wink on his broad face, 
and, slapping the inter ferer on the back with a 
leg-of-mutton fist, rejoined: 

'' 'Wljiy, drop it ! It pleases her and it don't 
hurt me!'" 

A "misfit" substitute 

(Related by the President to ''Grace Green- 
wood") : 

"As I recall it, the story, told very simply and 
tersely, but with inimitable drollery, ran that a 
certain honest old farmer, visiting the capital 
for the first time, was taken by the member of 
Congress for his 'deestrict,' to some large gather- 
ing or entertainment. He went in order to see the 
President. Unfortunately, Mr. Lincoln did not 
appear; and the Congressman, being a bit of a 
wag, and not liking to have his constituent dis- 
appointed, designated Mr. R., of Minnesota. He 
^N2iS a gentleman of a particularly round and rubi- 
cund countenance. The worthy agriculturist, 
greatly astonished, exclaimed : 

" Ts that old Abe? Well, I du declare! He's 
a better-lookin' man than I expected to see; but 
it do seem as how his troubles have druv him to 
drink!'" 



V^ANTED TO SEE THEM SPREAD THEMSELVES 

It is related that the ushers and secret service 
officials on duty at the Executive Mansion dur- 
ing the war were prone to congregate in a little 



ADDITIONAL LINCOLN STORIES 371 

anteroom and exchange reminiscences. This was 
directly against instructions by the President. 

One night the guard and ushers were gath- 
ered in the Httle room talking things over, when 
suddenly the door opened, and there stood Presi- 
dent Lincoln, his shoes in his hand. 

All the crowd scattered save one privileged 
individual, the Usher Pendel, of the President's 
own appointment, as he had been kind to the 
Lincoln children. 

The intruder shook his finger at him and, with 
assumed ferocity, growled: 

'Tendel, you people remind me of the boy 
who set a hen on forty-three eggs." 

''How was that, Mr. President?" asked Pendel. 

"A youngster put forty-three eggs under a 
hen, and then rushed in and told his mother 
what he had done. 

" 'But a hen can't set on forty-three eggs/ re- 
plied the mother. 

" 'No, I guess she can't, but I just wanted to 
see her spread herself.' 

"That's what I wanted to see you boys do 
when I came in," said the President, as he left 
for his apartments. 

SAFETY IN NEGLECT 

Mr. Chase bemoaning that in leaving home he 
had in the hurry forgot to write a letter, Lincoln 
sagely consoled: 

"Chase, never regret what you don't write — 
it is what you do write that you are often called 
upon to feel sorry for !" 



372 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 



RUNNING FEVER 

In debate, at Springfield, 111., December, 1839, 
Lincoln said: 

''There is a malady of vulnerable heels — a spe- 
cies of running fever — which operates on sound- 
headed and honest-hearted creatures very much 
as the cork leg in the song did on its owner. 
When he had once got started on it, the more 
he tried to stop it, the more it would run away. 
A witty Irish soldier always boasting of his brav- 
ery when no danger was nigh, but who invar- 
iably retreated without orders at the first charge 
of the engagement, being asked by his captain 
why he did so, replied : 

'' 'Captain, I have as brave a heart as Julius 
Caesar ever had; but, somehow or other, when- 
ever danger approaches, my cowardly legs will 
run away with me.' " 

LET THEM BE SAVED 

The Reverend Mr. Shrigley, of Philadelphia, 
having been appointed hospital chaplain, the 
President sent in his name to the Senate. A dep- 
utation came on to protest against his confirma- 
tion, on the ground that he was a Universalist, 
a large-minded man, who did not believe in 
endless punishment. Logically, he believed that 
''even the rebels will be saved," concluded the 
opposition, horrified. 

"Well, gentlemen," determined the President 
gravely, "if that be so, and there is any way 
under heaven whereby the rebels can be saved, 
then, for God's sake and for their sakes, let the 
man be appointed." 



ADDITIONAL LINCOLN STORIES 3 73 



PATHOLOGIC PRECEDENCE 

A deputation was pressing the claims of a so- 
licitor for a consulship, the plea being that his 
health would be benefited by residence on these 
Fortunate Islands. The Lord Bountiful termi- 
nated the interview by lightly saying: 

"Gentlemen, I am sorry to say that there are 
eight other applicants for the place — and all of 
them are sicker than your client!" 

TWENTY APPLICANTS, NINETEEN ENEMIES 

Hampered, harassed, and hounded by office- 
seekers, the President once opened his confidence 
on this irritating point to a conscientious public 
officer. He wished the Senators and others 
would start and stimulate public sentiment to- 
ward changes in public offices being made on 
good and sufficient cause — that is, plainly, never 
on party considerations. The ideal civil service, 
in a word. Nine-tenths of his vexations were 
due to seekers of sinecures. 

'Tt seems to me that such visitors dart at me 
and, with finger and thumb, carry off a portion 
of my vitality," was his saying. 

His hearer laughed at the image, but the other 
pursued earnestly: 

'T have made up my mind to make very few 
changes in the offices in my gift for my second 
term. I think, now, that I shall not move a 
single man, except for delinquency. To remove 
a man is very easy, but when I go to fill his place, 
there are twenty applicants, and of these I must 
make nineteen enemies." 



3 74 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 



THEN, OR NOT AT ALL 

An old man came from Tennessee to beg the 
life of his son, death-doomed under the military 
code. General Fiske procured him admittance to 
the President, who took the petition and prom- 
ised to attend to the matter. But the applicant, 
in anguish, insisted that a life was at stake — that 
to-morrow would not do, and that, in order to be 
of any avail, the decision must be made on the 
instant. 

Lincoln assumed his mollifying air, and in a 
soothing tone brought out his universal sooth- 
ing-sirup, the little story : 

"It was General Fiske, who introduced you, 
who told me this. The General began his career 
as a colonel, and raised his regiment in Missouri. 
Having good principles, he made the boys prom- 
ise then not to be profane, but let him do all the 
swearing for the regiment. For months no vio- 
lation of the agreement was reported. But one 
day a teamster, with the foul tongue associated 
with their calling and mule-driving, as he drove 
his team through a longer and deeper series of 
mud-puddles than ever before, unable to restrain 
himself, turned himself inside out as a vocal 
Vesuvius. It happened, too, that this torrent 
was heard surging by the Colonel, who called 
him to account. 

'' 'Well, yes, Colonel,' he acknowledged, T did 
vow to let you do all the swearing of the regi- 
ment ; but the cold fact is, that the swearing had 
to be done thar and then, or not at all, to do the 
'casion justice — and you were not thar!' 

''Now," summed up Mr. Lincoln to the en- 
grossed and semi-consoled parent, 'T may not be 



ADDITIONAL LINCOLN STORIES 375 

there, so do you take this and do the swearing 
him ofif!" 

He furnished him with the release autograph, 
and sent another mourner on his way rejoicing. 

MATCHING STORIES 

The President looking in at the telegraph- 
room in the White House, happened to find 
Major Eckert in. He saw he was counting 
greenbacks. So he said jokingly: 

'T believe you never come to business now but 
to handle money !" 

The officer pleaded that it was a mere coin- 
cidence, and instanced a story in point: 

"A certain tailor in Mansfield, Ohio, was very 
stylish in dress and airy in manner. Passing a 
storekeeper's door one day, the latter puffed 
himself up and emitted a long blow, expressive 
of the inflation to oozing-point of the conceited 
tailor, who indignantly turned and said: T will 
teach you to blow when I am passing !' to which 
the storekeeper replied: 'And Pll teach you not 
to pass when I am blowing!'" 

"Very good !" returned the hearer. "That is 
very like a story / heard of a man driving 
about the country in an open buggy, caught at 
night by a pouring rain. Passing a farmhouse, 
a man, apparently struggling with the effects of 
whiskey, thrust his head out of a window, and 
shouted loudly: 

"'Hello!' 

"The traveler stopped for all of his hurry for 
shelter and asked what was wanted. 

" 'Nothing of you !' was the blunt reply. 

" 'Well, what in the infernals are you shout- 



3 76 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

ing ''Hello" for when people are passing?' an- 
grily asked the traveler. 

" 'Well, what in the infernals are you passing 
for when people are shouting hello ?' " 

The rival story-tellers parted ''at evens." 

MRS. Lincoln's glass hack 

President Lincoln had not been in the White 
House very long before Mrs. Lincoln was seized 
with the idea that a fine closed carriage would 
be the proper thing for "the first lady in the 
land." The President did not care much about 
it, but told his wife to order whatever she 
wanted. 

Lincoln forgot all about the new vehicle, so 
he was overcome with astonishment one after- 
noon when, having acceded to Mrs. Lincoln's 
desire to go driving, he found a beautiful shin- 
ing carriage standing before the door of the 
White House. Mrs. Lincoln watched him with 
an amused smile while he surveyed it, but the 
only remark he made was : 

"Well, Mary, that's about the slickest glass 
hack in town, isn't it?" 

A MATTER OF CHOICE 

"I met Lincoln again in 1859," said David R. 
Locke, "in Columbus, Ohio, where he made a 
speech, which was only a continuation of the 
Illinois debates of the year before. It is curious 
to note in this speech that Lincoln denied being 
in favor of negro suffrage, and took pains to 
affirm his support of the law of Illinois forbid- 
ding the intermarriage of whites and negroes. I 



ADDITIONAL LINCOLN STORIES 377 

asked him if such a denial were worth while, 
to which he replied : 

'' 'The law means nothing. I shall never 
marry a negress, but I have no objection to any 
one else doing so. If a white man wants to 
marry a negro woman, let him if the negro wom- 
an can stand it.' " 



DEMAND AND SUPPLY 

"It was a frequent custom with Lincoln," Miss 
Tarbell tells us, ''this of carrying his children on 
his shoulders. He rarely went down street that 
he did not have one of his younger boys mounted 
on his shoulder, while another hung to the tail 
of his long coat. The antics of the boys with 
their father, and the species of tyranny they ex- 
ercised over him, are still subjects of talk in 
Springfield. 

*'Mr. Roland Diller, who was a neighbor of 
Mr. Lincoln, tells one of the best of the stories. 
He was called to the door one day by hearing 
a great noise of children crying, and there was 
Mr. Lincoln striding by with the boys, both of 
whom wxre wailing aloud: 

" 'Why, Mr. Lincoln, what's the matter with 
the boys?' he asked. 

" 'Just what's the matter with the whole world,' 
Lincoln replied ; 'I've got three walnuts and each 
wants two.' " 

A NON-COMMERCIAL RATING 

A New York firm applied to Abraham Lincoln 
some years before he became President, for in- 
formation as to the financial standing of one of 
his neighbors. Mr. Lincoln replied: 



3 78 TRIBUTES AND STORIES 

''I am well acquainted with Mr. Blank, and 
know his circumstances. 

"First of all, he has a wife and baby; together 
they ought to be worth $50,000 to any man. 

^'Secondly, he has an office in which there is a 
table worth $1.50, and three chairs worth, say, 
$1.00. 

"Last of all, there is in one corner a large rat- 
hole, which will bear looking into. 

"Respectfully, A. Lincoln." 

INVERSE PROPORTION" 

Lincoln's humor generally freed his criticism* 
of all offense. 

"He can compress the most words into the 
smallest ideas of any man I ever met," was per- 
haps the severest retort he ever uttered ; biit his- 
tory has considerately sheltered the identity of 
the victim. 



PLOUGHING AROUND THE GOVERNOR 

An amusing narration of Lincoln's was given 
to General James B. Fry, who reported it as 
follows : 

"Upon one occasion the Governor of a State 
came to my office bristling with complaints in 
relation to the number of troops required from 
his State, the details for drafting the men, and 
the plan of compulsory service in general. I 
found it impossible to satisfy his demands, and 
accompanied him to the Secretary of War's of- 
fice, whence, after a stormy interview with Stan- 
ton, he went alone to press his ultimatum upon 
the highest authority. After I had waited anx- 



ADDITIONAL LINCOLN STORIES 3 79 

iously for some hours, expecting important or- 
ders or decisions from the President, or at least 
a summons to the White House for explanation, 
the Governor returned, and said with a pleasant 
smile that he was going home by the next train, 
and merely dropped in en route to say good-by. 
Neither the business he came upon nor his inter- 
view with the President was alluded to. As soon 
as I could see Lincoln, I said : 

" 'Mr. President, I am very anxious to learn 
how you disposed of Governor Blank. He went 
to your office from the War Department in a 
towering rage. I suppose you found it necessary 
to make large concessions to him, as he returned 
from you entirely satisfied.' 

" 'Oh, no,' he replied, *I did not concede any- 
thing. Yon know how that Illinois farmer man- 
aged the big log that lay in the middle of his 
field ! To the inquiries of his neighbors one 
Sunday, he announced that he had got rid of 
the big log. 

" ' ''Got rid of it !" said they, "how did you 
do it? It was too big to haul out, too knotty to 
split, and too wet and soggy to burn. What did 
you do?" 

" ' "Well, now, boys," replied the farmer, 
"if you won't divulge the secret, I'll tell you how 
I got rid of it^ — / ploughed around it.'' 

" 'Now,' said Mr. Lincoln, 'don't tell any- 
body, but that's the way I got rid of the Govern- 
or — / ploughed around him, but it took me three 
mortal hours to do it, and I was afraid every 
minute he'd see what I was at.' " 



